East London Liquor Company with Alex Wolpert and Sam Garbutt Show Notes

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Mar 18

East London Liquor Company: Reinvention, Rye, and Writing a London Whisky Story in Real Time

This one felt like catching a distillery mid-stride.

Not at the beginning, not at the finish line, but right in the messy, fascinating middle where everything is being questioned, rebuilt, and redefined. Sitting down with Alex Wolpert and Sam Garbutt from East London Liquor Company (ELLC), it quickly became clear this is a tale of two eras: Bow Wharf, and everything that’s come after.

And maybe more importantly, a distillery asking what it actually means to make whisky in London in 2026.

From Bow Wharf to Hackney: a distillery forced to rethink itself

ELLC started in 2014, part of that early wave of modern craft distilleries trying to figure things out without much of a roadmap. London wasn’t exactly overflowing with whisky producers, and the broader English whisky scene was still more idea than identity.

From the beginning, the approach was simple, even if the execution wasn’t: make spirits that taste good. Not heritage-first, not story-first, not label-first. Flavor-first.

That philosophy carried them through a decade of growth, building a recognizable brand not just in London, but increasingly beyond it. But the real inflection point came in 2023, when a sudden financial squeeze forced the company into a brief receivership. Not a slow unraveling, but a sharp, disorienting jolt.

What followed wasn’t just survival. It was reinvention.

Instead of rebuilding the same model, ELLC came out the other side with something fundamentally different: a distillery without a permanent distillery. A blending house. A nomadic producer. A team that kept the brains of production in-house while letting the physical act of distillation happen elsewhere.

It sounds radical on paper. In practice, it’s surprisingly pragmatic.

A London whisky with no historical blueprint

One of the most interesting threads running through the conversation was what London whisky isn’t.

There’s no real historical style to recreate. No surviving bottles, no consistent mashbills, no shared template. What existed before the early 1900s was fragmented at best, and largely undocumented.

So instead of trying to resurrect something that can’t be clearly defined, ELLC leans into the freedom of not knowing.

That puts them firmly in what Alex describes as “new world whisky” territory. Not geographically, but philosophically. Flavor leads, not tradition. Curiosity over convention.

And in London specifically, that seems to be the rule rather than the exception. No one is really trying to plant a flag that says “this is what London whisky should be.” The category is still being written, one distillery at a time.

Why rye, and why their rye?

If there is a signature for ELLC, it’s rye. But not in the way you might expect.

At a time when rye in the UK was barely a footnote, often grown more as a cover crop than a serious whisky ingredient, they chose to lean into it. Not to replicate American or Canadian styles, but to reshape it.

Their version pulls heavily from malted barley alongside rye, creating something softer, more rounded, less aggressively spice-driven. The goal wasn’t to make a louder rye. It was to make a more drinkable one.

That decision traces directly back to Alex’s bartending background. The question wasn’t “what category do we fit into?” It was “what works in the glass?”

That mindset runs through everything they do. If it doesn’t make you want another sip, it doesn’t matter how clever it is.

Fermentation as a playground, not a checkbox

Where things really start to veer into ELLC’s own territory is fermentation.

While many distilleries treat fermentation as a step to manage, ELLC treats it as a space to explore. Brewing yeasts, saison strains, constantly shifting combinations depending on season, grain, and desired outcome. Predictability takes a back seat to possibility.

Saison yeasts in particular became a cornerstone. They don’t just consume simple sugars, they chew through everything, creating a cascade of acids and esters that carry through distillation and into the final spirit.

The result is new make that already feels layered, expressive, and a little unpredictable. Not always easy, but often rewarding.

It’s the kind of approach that only really works if you’re comfortable letting go of rigid consistency in favor of evolving character. Which, as it turns out, fits perfectly with where they’ve landed as a brand.

Nomadic distilling and the idea of a whisky house

The move away from a fixed production site wasn’t just a necessity. It unlocked something.

By working with partner distilleries across the UK, ELLC can match production to purpose. Different equipment, different strengths, different outcomes. Instead of forcing everything through one still, they can choose the right setup for the style they’re chasing.

Consistency doesn’t come from identical inputs anymore. It comes from blending.

That shift is embodied in their “Threads” release, developed alongside John Glaser. A layered blend of their own stocks and external components, including whisky from Loch Lomond, it represents a pivot toward thinking like a whisky house rather than a single-site distillery.

Blending isn’t an afterthought here. It’s the center of gravity.

Single casks, but only when they deserve it

For years, ELLC avoided single cask releases. The thinking was simple: one barrel rarely tells the full story.

That’s changed, but not because the philosophy shifted. If anything, it sharpened.

Now, single casks only happen when a barrel stands entirely on its own. Not interesting, not good, but complete. The kind of whisky that doesn’t need help from anything else.

Everything else? That goes back into the broader system. Into blends, into future expressions, into something that can be shaped rather than just presented.

The beauty of the unhinged

Then there are the outliers.

Projects like their Kilchoman rum cask release feel less like products and more like controlled chaos. A Jamaican rum meeting Islay peat, producing something that lands somewhere between whisky, rum, and something else entirely.

Even the tasting notes lean into it: banana, hot tarmac, sauerkraut, WD-40. It reads like a dare, but somehow still makes sense once you taste it.

That willingness to be a little unhinged, as Sam put it, might be one of the most honest reflections of what ELLC actually is.

Where they fit, and what comes next

In a young, still-forming English whisky scene, ELLC sits firmly on the experimental edge.

Not chasing a house style that stays fixed forever. Not trying to define the category for everyone else. Just continuing to push their own version of it forward.

There’s also a strong sense of community running through the broader scene. Information shared, ideas traded, boundaries tested collaboratively rather than competitively. It feels less like a finished industry and more like a workshop.

As for legacy, Alex doesn’t seem particularly interested in defining one.

The focus is on the present. Making whisky that surprises people. Pulling in drinkers who thought they didn’t like whisky and giving them something that changes their mind. Keeping things playful, a little provocative, and always rooted in flavor.

Because at the end of the day, if it doesn’t make you want another glass, none of the rest really matters.

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East London Liquor Company