Stillgarden Distillery are making Inchicore more green

Stillgarden Distillery are set to open their doors on Monday the 29th of June, after postponing their original launch date, the 24th of March.

Stillgarden, founded by Viki Baird and Pat O’Brien and headed by master distiller Éanna Burke, are a distillery in Inchicore, Dublin 8, who strive to “reinvent spirits.” Due to the coronavirus pandemic, they were forced to delay their original opening, but this didn’t slow them down. “We had our launch tickets printed and our party planned but we’re trying to look at the positives of everything,” laughed Baird. But Stillgarden Distillery are determined to stand out and not fade into the background among the huge pool of spirit companies in Ireland.

The ethos of the distillery is ‘science, community and nature’, which led to the creation of its community garden in Goldenbridge Estate, where it’s located. “Myself and my husband wanted to start a distillery, and we went on a journey of how we wanted to do it,” said Baird. “We didn’t just want to be another craft gin place; there’s loads round the world and in Ireland and I don’t think Ireland needed another one.

“Our idea was to do guerrilla gardening and that’s what went into doing the community garden here; we worked with a company called Green Edge who did the plan for us. There was so much wasteland and land overgrown with bushes around us Pat is a builder so he got a digger and cleared the area along with Neal, our gardener. So when that area was cleared we thought, of course we should grow botanicals in the garden, to use in here for our spirits and it just grew from there.”

“We have a social botanist campaign, in which we have hydroponic kits to grow seeds,” explained Aideen Hannigan, Stillgarden’s brand manager. “We gave about 25 people these kits and they started growing the seedlings at home; nourishing them and caring for them, with some guides and tips from our gardener.”

There’s a whole host of plants and vegetables growing in the garden, including rocket, mint, rosemary and chilli peppers. “The idea was to get people involved and get them loving gardening and loving the community,” continued Hannigan. “So then they came back and planted the grown plants in the community garden.

“And the end goal is for the people who helped grow the plants to come back and use the botanicals that have been grown to make their own gin – so it’s grow your own gin in a sense!”

“People have been so happy with what we’re doing that they’ve been bringing plants down themselves for us to plant in the garden!” Baird enthused.

While Stillgarden were unable to open to the public, they used their time to make hand sanitiser for the local community. “When Covid-19 first happened, our launch was cancelled and we have lots of room here so Éanna, our master distiller, came in and made some hand sanitiser,” said Baird. “Lots of distilleries wanted to make it a commercial thing but we just wanted to give it out to local people who need it.

“We gave it to the local shops who then gave it out to people because it was in such demand at one point. We had a lot of people ringing us asking if they could buy it but we didn’t want to capitalise on such a bad thing happening.”

Stillgarden launched their gin four weeks ago and their bottled cocktails three weeks ago, both being sold online. “We’re looking at doing a vodka next,” said Baird. “We’ve been experimenting with honeycomb vodka!” The honeycomb used has been coming from their on-site beehive, and they’ll be selling the harvested honey in a month’s time.

The distillery uses state of the art stills and technology, such as vacuum stills. “In a standard distillery you’d see a copper still or a pot still; these are vacuum stills, which are a more modern age, high end still,” explained Jordan Duncan, Stillgarden’s brand ambassador. “They mean you can extract flavours at much lower temperatures than usual and a much better yield.”

Now that the distillery is due to open to the public, so is their distilling academy. “We wanted to create the academy as well because it means people can get really involved,” said Baird.

The distilling academy is available for bookings of two and a half hours, which includes a class to make your own bottle of gin or vodka, using whatever botanicals you like. “There are 120 jars of botanicals,” boasted Baird. “We have some really experimental ones here, like Tayto crisps or Lyon’s tea.” During this class, you also receive a Stillgarden gin and tonic, a cocktail, and lunch. “It’s an insight into the distilling world and the science behind it.”

With such a community based ethos and experimental approach, it will be interesting to see what Stillgarden Distilery will do next.