Our Still
Gin Made the Whisky Way.
Our still is a lovingly handcrafted 500L copper pot still.
Unlike other stills used for gin, ours has a whisky head. The whisky head, a staple of whisky distilling, is called so because of the bulbous, onion-like shape it has.
Most other gin distilleries, large and craft alike, use what is known as a gooseneck still which is a much simpler design that isn’t as good at removing less desired oils from botanicals.
The whisky head encourages most the distilling gin to condense in the head and fall back into the pot which is a process known as reflux. This happens when some of the vapour meets a cooler surface inside the still, turns back into liquid, falls back down the still and is re-distilled. The more reflux there is, the lighter and more complex the spirit will be, as the gin is filtering out the heavier oils (that don’t taste good) out of itself.
Each of our two 16 plate Column stills work as a series of 32 single pot stills, inside their long vertical columns to further refine the gin after they have been distilled in our onion head pot still
These plates have small holes, or apertures, inside them. When our still is running, all these plates have a layer of alcohol on them that collects while also flowing down to the bottom of the still. Once the alcohol is at the bottom, it starts to distil again through each alcohol covered plate. This results in the gin purifying itself and allowing the best flavours of the botanicals and spirit to come through in the finished gin.
Besides our onion-headed pot still and 2 columns, we also have 2 vapour baskets. One right after our still and what one at the very end of our process.
These baskets are made of copper and can hold botanicals inside them while the distilled alcohol vapours flow through them which results in a lighter, more delicate flavour. On the other hand, putting botanicals directly in the alcohol results in a more robust flavour. By putting our botanicals inside our still and in our 2 vapour baskets, we have succeeded in extracting a very wide array of flavours.
Copper is traditionally used for whisky and gin. It is an excellent conductor of heat, second only to silver. This helps to evenly heat the alcohol and botanicals to produce a more balanced flavour.
Copper also reacts on a molecular level to produce a refined and smooth gin. Copper helps to strip out sulphuric compounds during distillation. This process helps remove unwanted flavours and smells from our final gin.