Harrogate spring water is the ingredient nobody tastes directly and everyone notices the effect of. Masons of Yorkshire cuts this dry gin with it and builds the recipe on the classical set - juniper, coriander, angelica root, orris root, liquorice root and cassia bark - at 40% ABV. There is no novelty botanical anywhere in that list, and that is exactly the point: the bottle exists as an argument for doing the standard thing carefully rather than for doing something new.

Juniper leads without hesitation, green and firm, which is how the style is supposed to begin. Coriander follows with a warm seed spice and its faint citric edge, and cassia bark lays a thin band of dry warmth across the middle. Underneath, angelica and orris do the structural work, drawing the base dry and leaving the fine powdery texture that orris always contributes, while liquorice root rounds the corners by exactly as much as is needed to keep the finish from turning severe. The floral note the gin is known for sits in that orris and coriander meeting rather than in any added flower. The water shows as clarity more than as taste: nothing muddy, nothing heavy, every element legible in its turn.

A gin built this way is made to be mixed and forgiving about how. A plain tonic is right, a premium one is not required, and lemon peel flatters the recipe more directly than anything else. Fill the glass properly, since the gin has the backbone to take dilution without thinning. It makes a clean Martini and a reliable Negroni, and it is the sort of bottle that quietly improves a house gin and tonic without anyone needing to think about why. There is no story here beyond doing the classical thing properly, and that turns out to be enough. It closes dry, floral and clean.