Long before Spokane Valley native Austin Harrington won a global bartending championship in London, his craft was already taking shape in Spokane — built on his mother’s culinary lessons, his family’s martial arts discipline, and his younger brother’s sci-fi drawings. 

Harrington has captured two U.S. national bartending titles and two international honors in 2026, culminating in September when his cocktail, named Science Faire, won the Art of Italicus Aperitivo Challenge global championship at The Savoy in London.

Yet, much of what distinguishes Harrington's work originated with his Spokane-area roots — in the kitchen of his mother, Jamie Aquino; through the discipline of martial arts; and in the childhood drawings and imagination of his brother, Jayden Harrington.

Harrington, a Central Valley High School graduate, now works in San Diego's beverage industry at an upscale cocktail bar dubbed Youngblood, where he earned the title of Italicus Bar Artist of the Year against eight national and regional champions.

The recent victory followed his Art of Italicus U.S. national championship win in New York, New York, in June and an Amaro Montenegro U.S. national championship in Phoenix, Arizona, in February. He has represented the United States at Amaro Montenegro's global competition in Bologna, Italy, in May, where he earned the People's Choice award. Harrington also was selected among the World Class U.S. Top 100 Bartenders in March and recognized as Best Bartender in San Diego Magazine's 2026 readers' poll.

The Art of Italicus 2026 competition challenged bartenders to reinterpret the spritz while drawing inspiration from a piece of art. Austin saw competitors frequently turn toward established painters, Renaissance works, and sculptures. 

He went in another direction, inspired by his little brother. As a child, Jayden drew pictures of Spider-Man, Star Wars, spaceships, and other science fiction creations and was known to love science experiments. Inspired by these memories, Harrington aimed to capture the feeling of a childhood science experiment in a futuristic cocktail.

"It's that moment as a kid where you're like, science is real, this is cool," Harrington says. "This is the kind of magic I wanted to bring."

Science Faire is created with Italicus Rosolio di Bergamotto, yuzu, champagne vinegar, frozen green grapes, and cucumber-mint tea activated with baking soda. Pouring the tea into the glass produces carbonation. Wearing a lab coat and safety glasses, Harrington intends the reaction to be part of the guest experience.

"Yes, it makes a good drink, but also creates a moment," he says. "The experience and the goal are to treat the judges like guests."

Developing his initial submission took about two months, and after advancing in the competition, Harrington practiced his presentation relentlessly, until the delivery became second nature, he notes.

His unconventional presentation required similar culinary skills that he spent much of his childhood insisting he didn't want. His mother, Aquino, has worked in the culinary industry for decades and taught cooking classes at The Kitchen Engine. Harrington says he grew up helping her around the kitchen, in an arrangement he remembers as more obligation than opportunity. People assumed he would eventually follow his mother's culinary path, but Harrington resisted the idea.

"Everyone had always said, 'Oh, you're going to follow in her footsteps. Are you ever going to go to culinary school?'" he says. "They thought that that was my path. I resisted that so much, but now I understand the value."

His career eventually brought him back to the kitchen on his own terms. Harrington now spends as much time working in the kitchen as he does behind the bar. Techniques he picked up from his mother — such as flavor development, preparation, food science, hospitality, and an understanding of how ingredients interact — have become fundamental to his craft.

Harrington's success also is credited to his father, Gabriel Harrington, and grandfather, Roy Harrington. Roy is credited with building a decades-long martial arts legacy in Spokane, and Gabriel trained and taught alongside his father before eventually taking over what is now Spokane Lotus Academy. The discipline embedded in the family's martial arts background is visible in Harrington's approach to his craft, and perhaps clearest in Science Faire, says his father, Gabriel.

For Gabriel, seeing the Spokane-area influences shaping his son's career is meaningful.

"His family being his motivation, and all of this coming together for him, is so cool to see," Gabriel says.

Additionally, Harrington's great-grandfather, Victor J. Felice, a longtime Spokane lawyer and magistrate of Italian-American heritage, helped inspire confidence in a competition centered around an Italian aperitivo.

Despite Harrington's success in the beverage industry, his career path was anything but planned. A Central Valley High School graduate, Harrington moved from Eastern Washington to New York to pursue fashion. It was while working at JCPenney in Manhattan, that a customer offered him an opportunity to work at a bar.

Bartending became a serious focus when Harrington returned to Spokane and worked at the Safari Room at The Davenport Tower, where he says he remembers watching the bartenders and deciding he wanted to work behind the bar. So, Harrington studied classic cocktail recipes, made flashcards, memorized menus, and continually questioned bartenders and managers.

"I studied every single day," he says.

Harrington's father, Gabriel, initially viewed bartending as a stop on his son's overall career path.

"For me as a dad, it was, 'OK, you're going to be a bartender for a bit. This is your stepping stone,'" Gabriel says, adding that a 2023 Spokane Bloody Mary competition changed his mind.

Gabriel stepped in to help Harrington prepare for the competition and watched how his son approached the drink with the precision and creativity of a chef, he recalls.

"It was the moment I went, 'Oh man, he's not just bartending,'" Gabriel says. "My son is building his craft."

Going forward, Harrington says he intends to keep improving and refining his craft while remaining creative. Upcoming plans include more competitions and expanding his international beverage-industry network. His long-term goal, however, will bring him back to Spokane, where he and his girlfriend plan to return and open a bar of their own someday.

"There'll definitely be a day where my lady and I move back to Spokane and start our bar," he says. "I don't think there's any question about that."