Hendrick’s Flora Adora Gin

Hendrick’s, the esteemed brand veteran of the Gin renaissance has expanded both its product line and shelf footprint in recent years with their Cabinet of Curiosities collection. Flora Adora is inspired by the aromas of a flowering garden, with bees, butterflies and of course— flowers.

Flora Adora’s botanical bill is rich with pungent blossoms, including lavender, rose and hibiscus and has been released as a limited edition in 2023.

Tasting notes

Aroma: Unctuous and thick, Flora Adora Gin indeed embodies the aromas of a garden in bloom. Jasmine-like, it immediately suggests heady flowers like honeysuckles and tuberose with some underlying honeyed vanilla facets and the slightest hint of juniper.

Flora Adora might be one of the most floral gins I’ve ever nosed.

Taste: While some hints of peach and rose come on early, so does the underlying gin. Green juniper dominates the mid-palate hovering in a floral haze of lavender and lilac. Coriander and some spice comes through as the spirit recedes on the palate, revealing a green herbaceous side.

Slightly mentholic and camphorous, its has the flavor of wet green leaves.

If you were to ask me to describe it as a style, I would say it’s unabashedly contemporary, but it reminds me a lot of some of the flavor profiles and trends I’ve tasted in Italian distilled gins during the past couple years.

Finish: Moderately long and cooling, juniper and grassy chamomile remain at a low volume long after sipping.

Cocktails and suggested serves

Right on the bottle, Flora Adora recommends the Wildgarden Cup. Featuring mint, lemon, cucumbers, raspberries and soda water, it’s a bit fussy but it lends itself nicely to being prepared as a summer party punch.

Overall though, Flora Adora is a challenging mixing gin. In some preparations, such as the Tom Collins the floral notes can come across a bit soapy. Intensely perfumed, it has qualities that will endear it to Martini fans; however, the herbaceous pair of vermouth and Flora Adora is unbalanced and almost overwhelming. Though I will say that in both, you will still be able to taste the juniper.

Overall, Hendrick’s Flora Adora Gin

Hendrick’s has had a pretty good track record with their Cabinet of Curiosities collection— most are middling to quite good. However, Flora Adora loses me. Even as an ardent fan of floral flavor profiles in gin, Flora Adora is too much of a good thing.

Firstly, while evocative, the floral notes are so overdone that that readily dial into some of the least positive associations of flowers as flavoring— it can taste like soap in some preparations— or at the best, it’s reminiscent of overwhelming soliflore perfumes of yesteryear (their popularity, especially in the late 19th and early 20th century is why some older folks might associate this scent with “Grandma’s purse satchel).

But digressions aside, Flora Adora is the gin I always wanted, executed less successfully than I would have expected from Hendrick’s.

Hendrick’s Lunar and Hendrick’s Midsummer Solstice special editions both play with an even more floral-forward profile, and do so more successfully than Flora Adora.

I’m disappointed, but I can only recommend this to the most serious Hendrick’s collectors. As a gin and as a mixer, it fails to hit the mark.