Holyrood Distillery: City Centre Experience

Holyrood Distillery: a sensory experience

Nestled amongst Newington’s residential buildings at the edge of Holyrood park, Holyrood Distillery is an homage to flavour that brings the magic of distilling right into the city.

Holyrood Distillery is the first single malt distillery in the heart of Edinburgh for nearly 100 years. And whilst it acknowledges that history, it certainly looks to the future.

I was very pleasantly surprised when I visited on launch night. The new exterior is modern but blends in nicely, whilst the inside is impressive technicolour glitz: the focus is really on flavour, with each colour of the rainbow representing a different taste quality in the spirit.

Holyrood Distillery flavour wheel

Visitors enter through the gift shop, where there’s a fantastic selection of items. As we come up to Christmas you should definitely head there for beautiful bottles of gin as well as coasters, glassware, tote bags, tea towels and more.

Gift shop at Holyrood Distillery

Upstairs, tours begin with a talk through flavour profiles and a smell test where you can identify 6 scents in conical flasks. The interactive iPads and polished copper fittings give everything an exciting, modern, vibrant feel.

A still at Holyrood Distillery

A stroll through the pipes and vessels for distilling and then it’s out again to the bar, where you can taste the current offering of gin and gin liqueurs. Unlike whisky, gin only takes a few days to make, rather than on average 12 years.

I wholeheartedly recommend the rhubarb and black pepper gin liqueur, as well as the blood orange. We enjoyed the regular gin with Fevertree tonic too, but it’s the liqueurs I can imagine will make the biggest splash, rivalling Edinburgh Gin’s.

So keep an eye out in your local bar and when you get the chance, book yourself a tour around the multi-coloured marvel that is the distillery.