The Whisky Type

Category: Tours & Tastings

Art & Whisky // Maker’s Mark Distillery in Loretto, Kentucky

It’s no question that there is an art to whisky, but nowhere is that idea more prominent than at Maker’s Mark Distillery in Loretto, Kentucky. Nestled in the gentle hills of Marion County—a little more than an hour from both Louisville and Lexington—Maker’s Mark blends craftsmanship, tradition, and design into one of the most beautiful bourbon experiences in the Commonwealth.

Established in 1953 by Bill and Margie Samuels, Maker’s Mark is best known for its wheated bourbon recipe and the iconic red wax that seals every bottle.

Both of these defining features were inspired by Mrs. Samuels, whose distaste for the bourbons of the day led her husband to create a softer, more palatable mash bill, using red winter wheat to balance the necessary corn. Her influence didn’t stop there; the standard Maker’s Mark bottle shape, label design, and hand-dipped wax were all her ideas, now permanently woven into the brand’s identity.

To this day, every bottle is dipped by hand on site, the liquid wax dripping down the neck of the bottles as they shuttle down the assembly line.

Seeing the brand’s bottles dipped in person is not for the faint of heart. But for the brave souls who make the trek down narrow winding roads toward the rural distillery, they are rewarded with a stunning pastoral scene and, for a few months this fall, the art of world renowned glass artist, Dale Chihuly.

Orange Hornet Chandelier (2025)

Chihuly’s relationship with Maker’s Mark has spanned more than a decade; 2025’s installation marked a return to the Loretto campus, and a permanent installation of his work, titled The Spirit of the Maker, casts a warm glow over a collection of barrels held in a narrow space alongside the gift shop.

The 2025 exhibit drew new attention to this permanent artwork while incorporating other sculptures, including some new pieces inspired by the distillery.

The Spirit of the Maker (2013)

The Maker’s Mark Tour

While Chihuly’s art is what drew me out to the distillery on Friday, December 5, I wasn’t going to miss the chance for a tour. I chose the Maker’s Mark Tour, the distillery’s most popular option, to learn about the brand’s history.

Guided by a friendly and charismatic gentleman named Chad, our group of 15 or so explored the distillery’s historic still house (predating the Maker’s Mark brand at least half a century), warehouses, and label production, along with the bottling line where every bottle of Maker’s Mark Whisky receives its famous wax. The tour ends with a tasting of four Maker’s Mark whiskies and the opportunity to purchase and dip your own bottle in the gift shop.

Along the way, we learned of the Samuels’ family’s whisky legacy, which stretches all the way back to Scotland and inspired the brand’s use of the e-exclusive “whisky” on their products. Winding through the black-walled buildings, Chad explained how Mr. Samuels pivoted from a successful career in Louisville to purchase the already-established farm and distillery in rural Loretto. The still-in-use still house is the oldest in the country and home to a column still standing 5 stories tall.

Legend has it that the Samuels family decided on the brand’s singular whisky recipe by baking a variety of proposed mash bills into loaves of bread. The best tasting loaf won out, with a mix of 70% corn, 16% soft red winter wheat, and 14% malted barley. Maker’s Mark 46 came about from a similar burst of experimentation, with 45 unsuccessful attempts to incorporate French oak staves into the maturation process before landing on the winner.

Distillation and its corresponding branding efforts have historically been led by men, but Mrs. Samuels was no silent partner in the creation of Maker’s Mark Whisky. Her contributions to the spirit’s recipe and design are properly appreciated at Maker’s Mark. Not only did Mrs. Samuels choose the shape of the bottles and introduce the red wax, but she designed the mark of Maker’s Mark and hand-wrote the original labels, which are still finished on an antique die cut press operated on site.

Exploring Star Hill Farm

The moment the tour concluded (following a walk through the aforementioned glowing whisky hallway), I jetted off to the nearest Walmart in nearby Lebanon, KY to pick up an SD card. Despite a veritable stack of cards at home, I had set out for adventure with an empty camera. There was no way I was returning to Lexington without some proper photos.

Once back on site, I paused for a quick lunch (a delicious salmon sandwich) at Star Hill Provisions, the farm-to-table restaurant nestled within the distillery grounds. Then I took my now-equipped camera and began to wander around.

“Where can I not go?” I had asked Chad upon my return. In response, he handed me a map with two buildings clearly marked “not open to the public.” Beyond that, the world—or, more accurately, the farm—was my oyster.

With much of the campus open to guests, I spent the afternoon photographing the Chihuly installations and weaving through historic buildings that make Maker’s Mark feel more like a preserved village than a modern production site.

A couple of passing Maker’s Mark staffers quickly clocked my camera and stopped to point out the best vistas. One even offered to take a photo of me, which I politely declined—I much prefer my place behind the viewfinder—but these interactions positioned Maker’s Mark as one of the nicest distilleries I’ve visited, both at home and abroad.

Dale Chihuly is not only known for his art, but for the way he integrates the glass shapes into the surrounding environment. The first time I experienced Chihuly’s art was at the Clinton Library in Little Rock, Arkansas. The second time was at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Arizona home, Taliesin West.

At Maker’s Mark Distillery, the outdoor sculptures emerged from the grounds in sharp contrast to the grass, earth, and snow below. Scattered throughout the campus, they seemed as natural as the buildings, positioned like flowers bursting through the cold soil in spring.

Sapphire and Platinum Waterdrop Tower (2017)

Sol Del Citrón (2014)

Moonbow Fiori (2025)

In the cellar, colorful fan-shaped glass explodes from the ceiling over the oak barrels below. Utilizing extra pieces from the gift shop’s ceiling installation, the beauty of the End of the Day Persian Chandelier simply can’t be captured in photographs.

But lord, did I try.

End of the Day Persian Chandelier (2015)

Nearby in the warehouse, a collection of Venetians—elaborate glass vases—were tucked between the barrels, each delicate shape standing in contrast to the sturdy, whisky-filled wood vessels and racks around them.

I even found a typewriter, tucked on a dusty desk in the “Quart House.” The small building once served as a package whisky store (and possibly a toll house for the now-defunct railroad). Dating back to 1889, it’s now on the register of historic places as the oldest still-standing location of its kind, a bit of Kentucky history preserved in Maker’s Mark history.

Starting with Art at Maker’s Mark Distillery

When I was both properly cold and due back to Lexington, I ended my excursion with a quick walk back through the Visitor Center, where all tours—and the experience of art—begin.

Upon arrival at Maker’s Mark Distillery, Guests enter through a gallery, thoughtfully lit and enhanced by high ceilings. I was late and distracted (per the usual) and had failed to notice the colorful welcome on arrival, but appreciated it all the more now, knowing the story of the Samuels family and their whisky.

Even the bathrooms are stunning at Maker’s. While I can’t speak to the men’s room, the ladies is carefully constructed of stone and tile to envelope visitors in a beautiful experience at every turn.

At the back of the Visitor Center is a small cocktail bar, where I met Whisky Jean Samuels, the distillery cat who was completely unbothered by my presence.

Whisky Jean rested on a leather sofa under yet another permanent Chihuly installation, Amber & New Oak Chandelier (2017). It’s not pictured, because I was, in true form, focused on the cat.

If I’d had more time, I would have lingered long enough for a drink, but my evening plans were calling, and I chose safe driving over happy sipping—especially on the single track roads surrounding the distillery.

As I walked to my car, I took one last slow look across the campus. The light was fading, and Christmas lights were starting to sparkle through the trees, ready for the Ambassadors that would arrive within hours.

Maker’s Mark has always been known for its whisky, but being there in person makes it clear that its magic lies just as much in the people, the place, and the art they’ve woven into every turn. Even without Chihuly’s sculptures shimmering in the background (the exhibit ended December 7), Maker’s Mark is not just a distillery that creates whisky. The Samuels family has curated a total experience, every drop crafted with intention.

Sláinte, y’all.

What to Know About Visiting Maker’s Mark Distillery

For those who choose quick answers over the magic of prose, here are few FAQs about Maker’s Mark Distillery, a major attraction on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail.

Where is Maker’s Mark distillery located?

Maker’s Mark Distillery is in Loretto, Kentucky, about an hour south of Louisville.

How much does it cost to tour the Maker’s Mark distillery?

As of December 2025, the Maker’s Mark Tour starts at $30. Other tour experiences range in price.

Is Maker’s Mark distillery worth visiting?

Hell yes! Maker’s Mark offers one of the most immersive and visually stunning distillery experiences in Kentucky, with hand-dipped bottles, a rich family history, and seasonal art installations.

Can I visit Maker’s Mark without a tour?

You might be able to visit Maker’s Mark at Star Hill Farm without a tour—but do you really want to?

Does Maker’s Mark still hand-dip every bottle?

Yes. Every Maker’s Mark bottle is still hand-dipped in red wax at the Loretto, Kentucky distillery.

🥃 The Whisky Type is a self-funded project powered by equal parts curiosity, chaos, and whisky. If you’d like to support Carolyn’s questionable life choices and excellent content, buy her a dram! https://ko-fi.com/thewhiskytype

December 11, 2025
Resilience & Revival // Old Pepper Distillery (Lexington, KY)

Americans love a comeback story, and it’s even better when it features whiskey.

The James E. Pepper Distilling Co. in Lexington, Kentucky forms the cornerstone of the city’s current Distillery District, but its roots stretch back to the origins of the nation. James E. Pepper, the namesake of the surviving Old Pepper Distillery, was a third-generation distiller. His grandfather began making spirits during the American Revolution, passing the trade down to his son and grandson.

James took over the family business as a young man, after the deaths of his whiskey and literal forefathers. He quickly went bankrupt. The younger Pepper lost the distillery—but not its legacy, walking away from the proceedings with his family’s cherished recipes.

The new (at the time) Old Pepper Distillery was built in Lexington in 1880, and Pepper began recreating his family line of spirits.

If you look beyond the tour guide’s enthusiastic delivery of these facts, it quickly becomes clear that James E. Pepper was not the best businessman. He soon lost the distillery a second time, thanks in part to less-than-successful ventures in horse racing. The property was only returned to him because of his wife, Ella O. Pepper. Ella was a woman of family means who not only rescued James’ horses at auction, but bought back his distillery too.

That’s not to say that Pepper didn’t have his impact on the whiskey world. When the state of Kentucky mandated that whiskey could only be bottled by third-party intermediates (a well-intended effort to minimize whiskey tampering), Pepper sued. He won the right to bottle his own spirit, and also introduced the practice of sealing each bottle, slipping a label across the cork to ensure the whiskey’s quality.

Pepper and his namesake distillery might have been knocked down a few times, but it always got up to fight again. The distillery survived Pepper’s death in 1907, though it passed out of the family a year later. It even survived prohibition, which devastated many distilleries across the nation. But what Old Pepper couldn’t quite survive was the wave of changing trends. Americans’ shifting preference for clear liquor in the 1950s and 1960s delivered the final punch, and the distillery shuttered, remaining closed for more than half a century.

Today whiskey again flows inside the walls of Old Pepper Distillery. The tour, which begins in a small museum of old advertisements and bottles, explores the history of luck, passion, and circumstance surrounding the brand.

The current owner is not a member of the Pepper family, nor connected to them in any way outside of the distillery. He came into his position as a result of intersecting interests, as he began to research the now-unknown whiskey brand that sponsored boxer Jack Johnson in 1910. The connection between distillery and boxer was captured in a photograph of Johnson’s infamous match against Jim Jeffries.

For whiskey purists, that tentative connection makes the James E. Pepper of today relatively suspect. The distillery’s original license number was reassigned as part of its resurrection, and the name repainted on its walls brick walls. The spirit that flows is not made from James E. Pepper’s original recipes, but recreated through careful assessment of surviving bottles.

While the James E. Pepper visitor experience hinges on the full history of the name, it is not a history that truly belongs to the current owner or brand. Whether or not that is a good or bad or neutral thing remains up for debate.

Suspending all existential discussions, visiting the current operations is, objectively, a lovely experience. The visitors center is small, but nicely laid out, with a small bar for flights and tastings. The tour takes you from the museum into the production floor, where the spirits run through a column still rising two stories high. You end with a guided tasting of the distillate, as well as the distillery’s flagship Bourbon and Rye expressions, before being escorted back to the entrance and shop.

Since its rebirth, Old Pepper has become surrounded by restaurants and shops, many built into the original distillery buildings. Visiting the distillery alone would fall short of the potential of the Distillery District, which now hosts two other distilleries, a coffee shop, a brewery, a boutique ice cream shop, bars, restaurants, shopping, and more.

So after concluding my tour with a sip and purchase of the distillery’s single malt whiskey (unsurprisingly my favorite of the core range) and an old fashioned cocktail (of which James E. Pepper was a passionate advocate), I ventured back into the sunlight and cacophony of the surrounding district. I found tacos at Desperados Cantina and a strawberry-balsamic sorbet at Crank and Boom, enjoying the warm Kentucky sunlight on a perfect Sunday afternoon.

Slàinte, y’all!

August 12, 2024
Whiskey Del Bac // Sonoran Single Malt

If you’re not actively looking for Whiskey Del Bac’s award-winning distillery in Tucson, Arizona, you’re not likely to find it. Nestled against the I-10 highway in an industrial park on the west side of town, only an understated decal to announces its front door.

Of course, for those who know about whisky (or even about craft beer), the massive silo on the back of the building is a dead giveaway that something is brewing inside the otherwise unassuming walls.

That silo holds some 50,000 pounds of unmalted barley, waiting and ready for a trip into the drum malter inside. Until a couple of years ago, Whiskey Del Bac (more formally known as Hamilton Distillers) only produced American Single Malt Whiskey. Like most modern single malt distilleries, they source the majority of their barley ready to be milled and mashed. But when founder Stephen Paul began to fiddle with the idea of making whiskey, he had a particular outcome in mind, which required him to malt his own barley, even as an amateur distiller.

That idea is now bottled and named Dorado, a mesquite-smoked single malt whiskey that, as I used to tell guests at the distillery, is more akin to a campfire than a boat fire.*

That’s a good way to segue into my disclaimer for this post: for six wonderful months between the fall of 2021 and the summer of 2022, I was employed by Whiskey Del Bac as a tour guide. For two or three days every week, I led guests through the history and production and experience of the distillery’s core range of whiskies, including Dorado. I’ve always looked back on that time fondly, and I’m still friends with many of the distillers, managers, and sales folk who remained.

I am no longer paid by Hamilton Distillers, but I’ve continued to be an enthusiastic advocate for what I truly believe to be one of the best American Single Malt Whiskies money can buy.

How Whiskey Del Bac Came to Be

Whiskey Del Bac was founded by Stephen and Amanda Paul, a father-daughter duo who are still involved in the distillery’s strategy and operations.

Unofficially, it was Stephen’s wife who deserves the credit for this American whiskey.

Stephen is a carpenter and a furniture maker by trade. For years, he owned a custom furniture shop on Tucson’s Fourth Avenue, a lively and iconic street in the Old Pueblo’s downtown area. Embracing the spirit and the natural resources of the Sonoran Desert (of which Tucson is a part), Stephen frequently employed mesquite wood to build his creations.

Mesquite is a hardwood that grows across the American Southwest. Both beautiful and dense, it is often compared to fine woods like oak and walnut. That makes it a phenomenal choice for furniture—and for smoking meat, which is, indirectly, how Whiskey Del Bac came to be.

The Pauls were (and are) scotch whisky drinkers. They also would utilize the off-cuts of mesquite wood from Stephen’s shop to smoke meat at home. Legend says that on one such night in the backyard, with a rich cut of beef (or something similarly meaty) on the smoker and a glass of scotch in her hand, Elaine wondered aloud whether one could smoke malted barley with mesquite rather than peat.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Whiskey Del Bac’s Core Range: Smoke, No Smoke, and Rye

At the spiritual heart of Whiskey Del Bac’s core range is Dorado, a smoky single malt whiskey that’s “mesquited, not peated.” It’s the whiskey for which the distillery is most well-known, at least in Tucson, where the marriage of local ingredients and local whiskey frequently receives high praise. Dorado offers a unique combination of sweet mesquite smoke and the bold vanilla-and-caramel flavors characteristic of new American Oak barrels.

Two other expressions, the Classic and the Sentinel, round out the distillery’s main offerings.

The Classic is a straightforward whiskey distilled from exclusively unsmoked barley, modeled in quality after a revered Speyside scotch like those from Macallen or Balvenie. It’s also the best of the distillery’s three main whiskies—and that’s not just my opinion. In the last few years, the Classic has earned an enviable 90 rating from Whisky Advocate and a 93 from sister publication Wine Enthusiast. The latter also listed the Classic in its Top 100 Spirits of 2021.

Sentinel, the distillery’s singular rye whiskey, is the only one of Whiskey Del Bac’s offerings not fully produced on site in Tucson. The raw spirit is distilled in Indiana before being transported to the desert to rest in Del Bac’s casks. The team uses ex-Dorado barrels to age the spirit, infusing the spicy rye with soft notes of mesquite smoke.

Beyond the core range, the distillery produces some seven (or more) special releases every year.

Normandie, Frontera, and Ode to Islay (my personal favorite) are annual limited releases. The three expressions utilize a brandy barrel finish, a Pedro Ximenez sherry cask finish, and a veritable crap-ton of mesquited barley, respectively.

The remaining releases are seasonal. The Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall Distiller’s Cuts vary from season to season and year to year. As head distiller Mark A. Vierthaler recently explained at a distillery open house, these distiller’s cuts allow his team space for creativity in an industry that otherwise thrives on consistency. The most recent quarterly expression, the Spring 2024 Distiller’s Cut, features “an unsmoked base matured in New American White Oak, finished in Tawny Port barrels, then blended with mesquite smoked American single malt petites eaux from a used bourbon barrel” according to Whiskey Del Bac’s website. The description is a mouthful, but so is the dram.

Next spring, it’ll be entirely different, a yet-unseen product of the distillers’ imagination.

Touring Whiskey Del Bac

Whiskey Del Bac still falls firmly in the “craft” category of distillation, filling a relatively small space with a single 500-gallon pot still and various other necessary equipment.

When you tour the distillery, you start in a narrow corridor between the shop and offices and the production floor. Here, you’ll see one of Stephen Paul’s handcrafted chairs, early iterations of the whiskey’s labels, and, currently, a handmade mill. During my time as a tour guide, the small room housed Paul’s original and intermediate stills, both curvy copper pots with a capacity of five and 60 gallons, respectively.

It’s here that you learn about Whiskey Del Bac’s original inspiration, and how Stephen’s drive for creation and quality led him down the path to the whiskey we know today. You’ll also learn about how Amanda, freshly returned from New York City, got involved—specifically by urging her dad to formalize his whiskey-making activities rather than be arrested for illegal moonshining.

From this ad hoc and ever evolving museum, you move to the back of the building, listening to the creaks and sighs of the equipment and systems. The tour guide, Ian in my case, will explain the malting process, performed here on a drum malter. He talks about the grain and the acrospsires and the smoke that are essential to the malting process, as well as the mechanics of moving it all from one tank to another.

Then it’s on to the mill and the mash tun and the business of making whiskey in earnest. If you’re lucky (or ask), you can taste the newly fermented distiller’s beer, which is not particularly palatable in terms of beer, but also not terrible either.

After the still and a discussion of the heads, hearts, and tails, it’s on to the barrels, which includes both the large finishing casks (rhum agricole, sherry, tequila, cognac, brandy, and more) and the standard new American oak quarter casks, inside of which every drop of Whiskey Del Bac begins its maturation journey.

Somewhere around the barrel area, our tour gropu was graced by the presence of Two-Row, a grey tabby cat who lives at the distillery full time. As head mouser, occasional greeter, and official mascot of Whiskey Del Bac, Two-Row loves to offer her two cents on every tour—and her two front paws to every tasting, often sipping them into unsuspecting guests’ water cups.

The tour finishes with a brief nod at the bottling area and then a settling into the tasting room, which, if we’re honest, is the primary reason anyone comes on these tours. Spread around two large rustic tables, you can try the three core expressions (Classic, Dorado, and Sentinel), and then, if available, any current limited releases. On my tour we sampled both the Frontera (an unsmoked barley malt finished in PX sherry casks) and the Spring Distiller’s Cut (see above).

Of course, every good tour exits through the gift shop. Or, in this case, the whiskey shop, where you can stock up on bottles and other bits and bobs. You’ll even find t-shirts emblazoned with the distillery’s mesquite, not peated motto.

As you shuffle back into the sunshine, laden with whiskey in paper bags, the bright heat and cacti of the Sonoran desert await. The landscape is harsh and unyielding, but among the scrub and the dust you’ll also find strength and beauty. This, truly, is the spirit of Whiskey Del Bac.

Slàinte, y’all!

*My fellow Islay whisky drinkers (and haters) will understand that reference…and most of my guests did too.

May 4, 2024
Port of Leith Distillery // Elevating Whisky in Edinburgh

It could be said that the whisky is nothing without tradition. Legends and practices of days long past flow through the industry’s walls and stills and barrels before slipping into your glass. This is a liquid that requires time and patience, with the initiation of the spirit and the final results often spanning generations.

At the same time, there’s something so remarkable about blazing your own path.

Case in point: Port of Leith Distillery, the towering new single malt scotch whisky distillery planted on the outer edges of Edinburgh’s northern shores.

Standing several stories tall, even the bare structure of Port of Leith’s distillation headquarters invite you to consider a new way to whisky. They’re not the only vertical distillery in the world, but they are the tallest. Photographs of the newly-built space’s construction phase reveal wash backs and tanks, glistening in shiny steel, suspended in the air and anchored in place meters above the ground.

The building is now complete, enclosing those tanks inside its modern walls along with various other equipment, a shop, and a swanky top-floor bar. The look is modern and clean, all dressed in orange and black and white. Entering through the front door, you’re greeted by a brightly lit neon sign: “Thank goodness you’re here!”

Thank goodness, indeed.

But while the distillery is ready for guests, their whisky is not. It’ll be another 8 years before the public gets to taste the first single malt whiskies from Port of Leith.

So what do you do in a whisky distillery that doesn’t have whisky?

Plenty, it turns out.

The tour at Port of Leith, a roughly 90-minute event, is not unlike most distillery tours. As you rise and fall through the distillery’s many floors, you can observe the mill and the water tanks and the stills, one wash and one spirit. You can run your hand through the crushed barley grains and see the 1970s cooler box one of the founders borrowed from his parents — it has a purpose, I promise. Your guide, named Ellie in my case, will tell you all about the history of the operation, the grit and determination that led them to their present state. You’ll taste the new make — two different varieties — and learn about the circular practices that make their distillation process sustainable.

If you’ve ever done another distillery tour, however, you’ll quickly note several points of differentiation. First and foremost: the decision to go vertical. While Leith’s limited landscape made it necessary to build up instead of out, it’s a stark contrast to the sprawling whisky estates of Scotland’s more rural settings. But consider also the barrels soon to be employed to age the distillery’s first whisky: rather than sourcing empty casks through a cooperage, the team went straight to the source, buying still-full casks of sherry and port, wrapping their own label around the now-bottled contents.

Whisky distillation is a science, but it’s also an art — and a game of faith. It’s hard to know now exactly what the results of the distillery’s efforts will be several years from now when the first bottles are released.

But while most whisky weighs heavy with the solemnity of tradition, Port of Leith’s joy in the spirit is obvious. You can see it in the bright orange motifs throughout, in the cheeky “property of” notations that adorn their merchandise, and in the curiosity that drives their experimentation with different strains of yeast, something that’s almost unheard of in the current Scotch industry.

Sitting in the distillery’s penthouse bar to wrap up my experience, the appreciation for whisky and innovation was palpable. To start, the whisky selection stretched high to the ceiling, requiring a library ladder to retrieve the uppermost bottles. In addition, the extensive spirits menu focuses on flavor impact rather than region: light and floral vs. big and bold and so on.

For two drams, I enlisted the knowledge of my hosts, ultimately selecting an Ardnamurchan and a private bottling from a Speyside distillery. Both were delicious. As were the chips, which I very much needed after several tipples of whisky and wine.

All in all, it’s hard not to root for Port of Leith’s success. And if you have to wait nearly a decade for whisky, you might as well do it in a 9-story building with stunning views.

Slàinte, y’all!

🥃 The Whisky Type is a self-funded project powered by equal parts curiosity, chaos, and whisky. If you’d like to support Carolyn’s questionable life choices and excellent content, buy her a dram! https://ko-fi.com/thewhiskytype

February 8, 2024
Sipping Spirits in the Mile High City: Denver, Colorado

Update: this post was intended to be part one of a two-part series, but it’s been six months, and my dog ate my homework (aka..my laptop ate my draft), so it’s been updated to a standalone post. It seems that another trip to Colorado is in order!

In July when I began planning a semi-impromptu trip to Denver, Colorado’s capital city, I didn’t intend to make it a “whiskey trip” per se. Yes, the primary driver of the visit was attending the first night of respected Scotch whisky writer Dave Broom’s brief US tour. And, as a single malt enthusiast, a visit to Stranahan’s Whiskey Distillery, the city’s well-known single malt makers, was required.

More, I expected to partake in a good amount of local beer. Colorado is, after all, home to the perrenial favorite of dads and hipsters everywhere, Coors Brewing, not to mention well-known craft breweries like Oskar Blues. But whiskey? I doubted that my explorations in the spirits realm would go very far.

I was—happily—wrong.

Big Chief Bottling Co. in Denver, Colorado; July 2023. Photo by The Whisky Type.

Colorado, an underrated whiskey destination.

By their current count, Colorado is home to approximately 40 distilleries producing craft spirits ranging from vodka to gin to bourbon and rye, not to mention American single malt and the nation’s first single pot still whiskey. Known collectively as the Colorado Spirits Trail, several of these distillers are peppered throughout the state, tucked between mountains and along distant trails, promising a bit of adventure with each sample. However, most are gathered along the state’s urban corridor spanning Colorado Springs to Fort Collins.

In Denver alone, there are approximately 15 distilleries, a fact I discovered when I googled “Denver Distilleries” on a whim last month. The first search result, published by VISIT DENVER, presented me with a list of no less than 12 active distilleries in and around the city. Another posting suggested a few more, topping off the list.

I had only a few days in the city to explore, so I quickly perused the webpages of each local distiller, determining the type of spirits they produced, a few points of interest, and, most importantly, where and when I could find them for a tasting. By the end of my research, I had identified nine targets for tours and tastings.

It was an ambitious plan and I’m not ashamed to admit that I failed to accomplish it. My alcohol tolerance is on the lower end of most whisky enthusiasts even without the added limitations of mountain elevation, so the effects of the alcohol quickly outpaced my ambitions. Even so, I managed to try spirits from five different distilleries while in Denver— and I was not disappointed by the experience. I’ll get into my experiences at each in part two, but first, let’s explore some of what, in my observation, makes Colorado’s spirits unique.

A vintage still at Stranahan’s Whiskey Distillery; July 2023. Photo by The Whisky Type.

Forget farm-to-table; this is grain-to-glass.

All whiskies journey from the fields to the still room to the barrel before landing in your glass, but in Colorado, that journey is often personal. Much like a farm-to-table restaurant, the distilleries that I visited almost unanimously noted their use of local grains and botanicals, mashing together Colorado’s rich agricultural history with their distillation present.

Nearly half of Colorado’s 66 million acres were used for farmland in 2022, according to a bulletin produced by the US Department of Agriculture. As a state, Colorado is ranked 5th in the nation for barley production, with 52,000 acres producing more than 5 million bushels last year, and 18th for corn, despite nearly 1.4 million acres and 148,000,000 bushels.

Those grains are utilized in a number of ways: as food for humans and livestock, for a variety of grain-based products, and, of course, for the state’s robust beer and spirit industries (fun fact: 87% of the state’s barley goes directly to Coors Brewing Company for their beer).

But it’s not just the grains or the geography that make Colorado spirits so, well, Coloradan. El Dorado Springs, a small unincorporated area near the city of Boulder, produces some of the best water in the world (and the best bottled water in the nation). Many nearby whiskey distilleries draw on this natural spring water at various points in the distillation process, particularly between the barrel and the bottle, and are quick to infer that this renowned spring water plays an important part in producing high quality spirits.

Of course, the question of whether “terroir” has an impact on whiskey is constantly under debate. A 2021 scientific study suggested that locality does, in fact, impact the final flavor. Still, some of the industry’s greatest minds suggest that landscape and climate have more of a place in marketing than in the glass.

The truth is, no one is really sure exactly what goes into the precise flavor of a whiskey, not even those who make it. Whether proven or promise, Colorado distillers seem to be marching ahead under the assumption that locality is, in fact, critical to the outcome. And they might just be onto something; in the spirits I tried, certain qualities did suggest a regional influence: the balance of botanicals selected for a local gin, for example, or even a unique grassiness to balance the spice of a rye whisky.

Using local grains isn’t, of course, new. Distilleries have been utilizing regional sourcing techniques for centuries, but a global economy has supplemented nearby sources with an open door to the world’s agricultural products. The commonality of this ancient practice throughout Denver’s distilleries is something that makes it—and those distilleries—unique.

The hybrid still at Stranahan’s Whiskey Distillery, Denver, Colorado; July 2023. Photo by The Whisky Type.

Keeping Colorado ( and its whiskey) weird.

Around the world, most distilleries use a pot still or a column still in their distillation process. On the occasion that they employ both in the same still house, they’re separate and distinct machines. During my visit to Stranahan’s Whiskey Distillery, however, I was confronted with something akin to Frankenstein’s monster—but much prettier.

The hybrid still, as they explain it, is believed to offer the best of both worlds in whiskey distillation: the even boiling and flavor-retention of a pot still and the efficiency and clean cut of a column. According to the tour guide, Stranhan’s was the first to employ the unusual stills, which featured a short, four-window column atop a wide pot. Their use has since spread, at least in the Denver area; I saw a similar configuration down the road at Laws Whiskey House.

Hybrid stills are not the only way in which Stranahan’s is forging its own path in distillation. Two other points of distinction center around their barrels and their boilings.

Early in the tour, our guide explained that the distillery boils their wort between the mash tun and the fermenter, a process that I asked the tour guide about after we concluded our tasting. “That’s how they do it in Scotland,” he told me confidently. According to my classes at the Edinburgh Whisky Academy, not to mention the production tours I’ve taken at Glenkinchie, Balvenie, GlenAllachie, and Bruichladdich, it’s not; wort typically is cooled after leaving the mash tun, not reheated. But I gently prodded a little further, and we speculatively decided that it could be part of the beer brewing process; Stranahan’s made its mark on the industry by first distilling beer (actual, intentional beer rather than distiller’s beer) into whiskey.

When we reached the barrel-packed warehouse, we also learned of Stranahan’s use of the Solera aging method, a process that is believed to increase the consistency of the spirits. Over time, some, but not all, of the whisky aging in the barrel is removed for bottling; it is then replaced with new make spirit, which mingles with the aged spirit left behind. It’s not a new method of aging, but it’s not one that has necessarily been widely adopted in the whiskey industry worldwide.

Stranhan’s is also using foudre barrels — massive, egg-shaped barrels more commonly employed in wine-making — but I’ll admit that I was both too far away from the tour guide and paying too little attention in that moment to understand why or how.

I have to wonder if Stranahan’s experimentation with new and old techniques may have come from its singularity; they were the first legal distillery in Colorado since prohibition. And while they were not the first to produce a single malt whiskey on American soil, the category was largely undefined (and unexplored) in 2006 when they released their first bottle.

There’s something to be said for having the space to forge your own path. Even the bourbon distilleries I visited seemed to be doing their own thing in one way or another, whether or not they are following more traditional distillation methods. With all eyes on the better-known American whiskey regions of Kentucky and Tennessee, perhaps Colorado distillers have had more room to play.

It’s likely that Colorado distilleries have charted a new course by necessity; the thin air and desert extremes of Colorado are a far cry from the cold, damp climates of Scotland and Ireland or even the humid, multi-seasonal atmosphere of the American mid-south.

When whisky is aged in a humid climate, alcohol is the first element to evaporate. But in a dry climate, water particles in the new make rush into the wood and the air ahead of the alcohol. This can result in higher-proof whiskey straight from the barrel, but desert angels are greedy, and distilleries lose a lot more product to evaporationoverall. As a result, the whisky can’t spend as much time in the barrel — and you wouldn’t necessarily want it to anyway. Wide swings in temperature throughout the year and within some days cause Denver’s barrels expand and contract at a rapid pace, creating more agitation within the spirit and greater interaction with the wood.

While that may present challenges to a distiller, it’s a good thing for whiskey lovers; it means that the spirits are ready (and, importantly, palatable) much more quickly than usual.

That’s a perfect way to segue into the tasting portion of my trip, but for that, you do have to wait—part two of my Denver trip notes (centered around the distilleries I visited) will be released later this week!

July 29, 2023
Corsair Distillery Tour

Rumor has it that the inspiration for Corsair Distillery’s distinctive label came from a trio of drunken, unbothered Scotsmen striding confidently down a Scottish road after an evening of troublemaking and revelry.

That, and the film Reservoir Dogs.

Either way, the spirits produced in this craft distillery are well represented by both its label and legend, bold and unbothered. Corsair’s roots span Kentucky and Tennessee, an area best known for bourbon (and a good bit of moonshine too). But they’re forging their own path, branching out from the whiskey family tree drawn by their regional forefathers.

In addition to the single malt and rye whiskies produced on Corsair’s pre-prohibition pot still (affectionately named “Ethyl”), the current lineup includes an American-style gin, a spiced rum, a barreled gin, and an absinthe.

Each bottle is carefully crafted, developed in small batches with experimentation and care, an answer to the ever-repurposed question “what if we…?” What if we smoked our barley malt with a blend of peat and cherrywood and beechwood? What if we spiced our rum, aged our gin in a barrel, and then put another spirit back in the barrel? What if we ignored all the propaganda around absinthe and made it anyway, tinting it bright red with hibiscus?

As we move through the space, we learn that our tour guide, Carter, has been doing this for years. He knows—and loves—what he’s talking about as ushers us through the small production floor and back across the courtyard to the tasting room for sampling.

Each sip of Corsair’s offerings is different, surprising. The flavors build and compete and then dance back together, never shy, always interesting. The space that the distillery inhabits (location one of two) is similarly complex, an early-1900s automobile factory turned modern retail space and museum. Like the whiskey, it’s easy to get lost in and, more importantly, even easier not to mind.

Slainte, y’all!

In My Glass

Corsair Distillery – Dark Rye
American Rye Malt Whiskey
Aged 1 Year; 42.5% ABV
USA (Tennessee)

On My Desk

1961 Olivetta Lettera 22, Made in Scotland

February 1, 2023