Distilling began at The Borders Distillery in Hawick on 6 March 2018.1,2,3 It was the first Scotch whisky distillery in the Scottish Borders since the one at Kelso closed in 1837.1,2,3 Its owner, The Three Stills Company (now The Borders Distillery Company), was set up in 2013.3,4,5 The distillery is housed in a former power station that later became an engineering firm's headquarters.6,7
The company's 4 founders, George Tait, Tony Roberts, John Fordyce and Tim Carton, all came from William Grant & Sons.3,4,5 In November 2015 it secured £10 million from private investors, led by Badenoch & Co, to convert the empty Turnbull and Scott premises.9,10 Badenoch's owner, Malcolm Offord, was to become chairman.9,10 Building work began in August 2016, though another account says November 2016.1,6 The distillery opened to the public on 1 May 2018.2,8 In 2019 it also distilled a grain spirit made from rye, matured in the same fresh-fill bourbon casks as its malt.11 In December 2021 The Three Stills Company Limited changed its name to The Borders Distillery Company Limited.4 In April 2024 it agreed a £35m funding package with the financing platform Ferovinum.12 Giancarlo Bianchi, formerly of Penderyn Distillery, was named managing director from 1 April 2026, taking over from John Fordyce.13,14,15
It works with 10 local farms and Simpsons Malt to grow its barley.1,3 The malt is unpeated, and John Fordyce said the Borders has no tradition of peat because cheap coal was close by.1,16 It takes process water from a borehole and cooling water from the River Teviot.6,16 It has 8 stainless steel washbacks, the tanks where fermentation happens.1,6 Fermentation lasts around 80 hours.1,17 Whiskypedia says the long fermentation is part of what gives the spirit a malty fruitiness.1,17 It has 2 wash stills for the first distillation and 2 spirit stills for the second.6,8 Steam heats the stills, and shell and tube condensers turn the vapour back into spirit.1 The stills have boil balls, and Fordyce said in 2019 that downward-sloping lyne arms, the pipes that carry vapour to the condenser, give a lighter style of spirit.1,16,18 He said the aim was an elegant, reasonably dry whisky.16 One Carter Head still, a type used to make gin or vodka, turns some of the new spirit into Kerr's Borders Gin and Puffing Billy Steam Vodka.6,16,19 The plant can make up to 2 million litres of pure alcohol a year.1,6,8
Every bottle in Peated with a vintage year.
Bottles in Peated distilled at The Borders Distillery, by release year.
| Year distilled | Bottles |
|---|---|
| 2020 | 1 |
| 2021 | 4 |
| 2024 | 4 |
| 2025 | 2 |
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