The Aviation is a gin sour with two liqueurs — maraschino and crème de violette — and a dusty pre-Prohibition history. It was first printed in Hugo Ensslin's Recipes for Mixed Drinks (1916), then nearly disappeared from American bartending when crème de violette stopped being imported. When Rothman & Winter began producing it again in 2007, the cocktail came back with it.
1/3 Lemon Juice. 2/3 El Bart Gin. 2 dashes Maraschino. 2 dashes Crème Yvette.
Hugo Ensslin, Recipes for Mixed Drinks (1916)Print, Then Silence
Ensslin was the head bartender at the Hotel Wallick in Manhattan, and his 1916 book is one of the last printed records of American bartending before Prohibition shut the trade down four years later. The Aviation appears with both maraschino and a violet liqueur — whether Ensslin's original called for Crème Yvette or crème de violette is contested between cocktail historians (Wondrich and Hess argue Yvette; Wikipedia and others cite violette; Ensslin's 1917 second edition uses Yvette by name). The two are siblings: Yvette adds vanilla and warming spices on top of violet, violette is purer floral. Either reads as the Aviation.
Both violet liqueurs went out of American production for decades. Harry Craddock's Savoy Cocktail Book (1930) printed the recipe without the violet element entirely — just gin, lemon, and maraschino. That truncated version is the one most bartenders learned through the late twentieth century. The full Ensslin spec was only widely restored once Rothman & Winter Crème de Violette became available in the U.S. around 2007.
The Spec
Two ounces gin, half an ounce lemon, a quarter ounce maraschino, a quarter ounce crème de violette. Shake hard, double-strain into a coupe. The drink takes on a pale lavender-blue color from the violette — the color the name was probably written for.
Why It Looks Like the Sky
The Aviation's color — pale violet shading toward sky-blue — is the most plausible explanation for the name. Aviation was a glamorous new technology in 1916; cocktails named after the era's marvels were common. There is no documented quote from Ensslin explaining the name, so it's safer to call this likely than to claim it as fact.
On Crème de Violette
A quarter ounce is the maximum before the drink reads as floral-perfumed. Rothman & Winter is the widely available U.S. option; Giffard makes a more concentrated version that should be used in slightly smaller amounts. If you only have maraschino, you have the 1930 Savoy version — a perfectly good drink, just not this one.
Garnish
A brandied cherry, dropped in. Lemon peel is also defensible — Ensslin doesn't specify.
Bottom Line
The Aviation rewards a clean London Dry gin and a careful pour on the violette. Get the proportions right and the drink is a quiet pre-Prohibition gem; get them wrong and it tastes like potpourri. Measure both liqueurs by the quarter-ounce, not by the dash, and shake it cold.