Walsh, which is now partly-owned by Italian drinks company, Illva Saronno, says the distillery will have a capacity to distil up to eight million bottles of Irish whiskey annually. A €25 million project, it claims it will be one of the largest independent whiskey distilleries in the Republic and is the first whiskey distillery to be developed in Carlow and the south-east in 100 and 200 years respectively.
The distillery will produce Walsh Whiskey’s premium Irish whiskey brands, The Irishman and Writers Tears. It says the distillery will be unique as the only distillery in Ireland to produce all three types of Irish whiskey in one still house, namely – pot, malt and grain.
Walsh Whiskey was established in 1999 by husband and wife, Bernard and Rosemary Walsh, and located on the 18th century Royal Oak estate by the River Barrow in County Carlow.
It entered a partnership with Illva Saronno in 2013 to expand the business through constructing a world-class distillery, maturing warehouses and a visitor centre at Royal Oak.
Once commissioned in early 2016, the two production lines, using both pot stills and column stills, will give Walsh the capacity to produce 650,000 cases (2.5m litres of pure alcohol (LPA’s) or 8m bottles) of whiskey annually. The company says the expansion of the business will lead to increased supplies of Irishman Whiskey and Writers Tears brands from 2019 when distribution will increase to more than 100 countries including China and India.
