March is full of exciting things. First up was International Women’s Day on Friday 8th March. Next is St Patricks Day, followed by the start of spring and finally, Easter!

Taking inspiration from International Women’s Day, we could not look past ‘Boss Lady’ Gin. Stillgarden Distillery produces sustainable modern Irish spirits for the modern spirit drinker. The company is becoming increasingly known for its quality brand, innovative products and disruptive approach.

It was founded by Viki Baird and Pat O’Brien in 2020, who are both passionate and dedicated to showcasing the best of modern Irish Spirits to the world. Based in Dublin 8, Stillgarden follows a cross-company sustainability focused business model. From growing and locally foraging ingredients in the community gardens (created from an area of wasteland), they look to the future, respectful of tradition and provenance but not bound by it.

The 3 pillars of what they do are Science, Community, Nature and they try to incorporate these in everything they do.

Science

Stillgarden uses modern and unusual distillation techniques to create their drink for e.g. Vacuum Distillation which enables them to extract flavours from botanicals at a lower temperature so as to avoid boiling the botanicals.

They also use a rapid ageing bath to speed up the process of ageing and flavour extraction. 

Their newest machine is an Apeks Supercritical flavour extractor which uses CO2 to extract flavours, these are typically used in CBD oil extraction but work extremely well for creating flavours for spirits.

Community & Nature

In early 2020 Stillgarden created the Social Botanist Project as a community of like-minded individuals who care about the environment and spaces we share together. In January 2020 they cleared debris and rubbish from an unloved green space to create a 450 sq. public space for the community such is their dedication to biodiversity and sustainability.

Boss Lady Gin is itself inspired by Stillgarden’s own Boss Lady, Viki Baird who is known for her hustle, vitality and dynamic character who created this gin to celebrate women everywhere.  Her’s is a project of love and passion and she is really keen for as many people as possible, to come and witness for themselves the movement that herself and Pat have created in Dublin 8.