Strathearn

Strathearn is a small distillery located in the southern Highlands of Scotland to the west of Perth. It is widely regarded as being Scotland's first micro-distillery and set the trend for all the new artisan spirits producers that have followed. Despite this new wave of craft distilleries, Strathearn remains one of Scotland's smallest. To date just a few single malts have been released. But expect more on the horizon as this pioneering distillery grows in reputation.

Strathearn has produced both peated and unpeated styles since distillation began in 2013. Unfortunately, very few people have sampled the whisky to date, so determining the characteristics of the spirits is difficult.

They have become known for experimental use of casks for maturation in addition to the use of orthodox casks such as bourbon whiskey casks, Oloroso sherry and virgin oak. Innovative casks such as cherry wood, chestnut and mulberry have been used and also a selection of differing cask sizes going down to small 50 litre ones. This resulted in trouble from the Scotch Whisky Association (SWA), who have strict laws to protect Scotch whisky production and its reputation.

Strathearn is tiny in comparison to many distilleries in Scotland. The annual capacity is just 30,000 litres. All production equipment is housed in just one room. This includes a former brewers mash tun, which has a 0.5 tonne capacity, and this feeds two stainless steel washbacks. The fermentation time is 82 hours. There are two copper Alembic-style stills - one wash still with 1,000 litre capacity and one spirit still with 500 litre capacity. There is a small warehousing complex on the site for cask storage. Most spirit is double distilled, but some is also triple distilled.

The distillery also produces gin and rum. Their Scottish Juniper Gin and Heather Rose Gin have both won numerous awards in global spirit competitions.

Strathearn was founded by Tony Reeman-Clark in 2013 with the idea of challenging the long-established laws and approach of making Scotch whisky. It is located in old farm buildings in rural Perthshire, close to the small village of Methven. This is about halfway between the towns of Crieff and Perth.

The distillery was operated by Reeman-Clark until the Autumn of 2019. Then the family-owned independent bottling and blending company of Douglas Laing purchased Strathearn. They plan to install new equipment so as to increase the production capacity to around 150,000 litres.

The first single malt release from the pioneering distillery appeared in December 2016. It was aged for just over three years in cask. Almost immediately after Douglas Laing took control a new batch of single malt was bottled. This was older than the previous release, coming from distillations in 2013 and 2014, and had been matured in virgin oak and first-fill Oloroso sherry casks.