A unique user experience and a fine dram all coming together for family distillers

The West Midlands Distillery has been busy putting the final touches on its brand new headquarters on the Waterfront in Brierley Hill, as well as popping open the cask on its first ever whisky.

Set next to the existing Dr Eamers' Distillery Bar and set to open in September, the new headquarters and distillery will offer a visitor centre experience and distilling school which, according to owner and founder Jordan Lunn, is set to be the first of its kind for whisky.

He also said that the new headquarters was a great step forward for the company and allowed it more space to work and to showcase its products.

He said: "In 2018, I quit my job and opened our first proper distilling site in Netherton, then opened Dr Eamers Distillery Bar on the Waterfront and moved to our current site in Rowley Regis in 2020, which is where we laid down our first whisky keg in 2021 and where it has sat for three years.

"We realised that we were unable to grow any further because of the number of whisky casks we had, which need a lot of space, so we needed another site and that search coincided with next door to our bar becoming available, so we made a decision to keep our gun and rum production in Rowley Regis, and have a purpose-built all-singing, all-dancing visitor experience next to our bar.

"We went for it and have spent the last 12 months fitting it out, doing all the work ourselves, other than the gas and electricity, while also juggling that with production, and we've got there and will be able to open the doors in a month's time."

Mr Lunn also explained how the visitor centre would work and how it was unique in the work it did.

He said: "It'll be an experience-led thing, not the sort of place where you will rock up and just have a drink, as you can do that in our bar next door, but it will a chance to book a tasting, to book a tour, to book an experience.

"The distilling experience is what it's all about and I have done a lot of research on this and cannot find anywhere else in the world that does this, which is a big claim, and will see people, working under our tutors, come in and produce their own whisky in the small stills we have.

"We'll then have special small casks just over a litre in size that we will fill and pay the duty, then people can take them home and age them to their desired liking, which I don't think is done anywhere in the world."

As well as the whisky experience, the distillery will also have a partnership with the nearby Copthorne Hotel, with discounted room rates for anyone doing the tour and the distillery experience.

The whisky distillery headquarters are just one part of the exciting times ahead for West Midlands Distillery, famed for Dr Eamers Gin, as the first batch of the whisky will be ready to put on sale on July 11 next year.

An event at Dr Eamers Distillery Bar on Saturday saw the first cask opened up and all those in attendance were able to try the whisky, which has aged for three years in a bourbon cask.

Mr Lunn said the casks had come from the USA, where they were legally only able to use the casks once and would sell the used ones to the whisky industry in the UK, so the distillery had ex-wine and ex-rum casks.

He said that the flavours that came from ageing the whisky in one of the casks would be wide-ranging and spoke about what people had taken from the first tasting in terms of flavour.

He said: "It's a whisky which is smooth and people said there were tastes of caramel, vanilla and fudge, with some people saying that it tasted like a Cadbury's Fudge without the chocolate on it.

"I've definitely got a taste of toffee from it, as well as vanilla, and I think the taste has links to industries around the region, such as Bird's Custard, which is a happy coincidence."

The release date of June 11, 2025 also holds a special place in Mr Lunn's heart as well, being the birthday of his late mother Sharon, who passed away last year, while the name of the whisky may also be a loving tribute to her.

He said: "We pencilled in that date to properly launch it on what would have been our mum's birthday as she helped to build and forge this for us and she died last year, so we want to honour her with that date.

"We have been working on the title, so there's a good chance that we will call it the Matriarch, after our mum, because the matriarch is the head of the family, the starter and the creator which gives birth to everything, so it will most likely be called that after her."

To find out more about the West Midlands Distillery and the process of making the whisky, go to westmidlandsdistillery.co.uk