Porter’s

The Origin Story

Made in a bar, not a boardroom

In 2015, Alex Lawrence, Ben Iravani and Josh Rennie were looking to push the cocktail program at their team's bar, The Orchid, forward. They wanted to create a premium gin and enlisted help from Andew Porter - an investor and biotechnology professor from Ben’s alma mater. He helped set up a micro-distillery in the bar’s basement with tools primarily used in scientific research. After learning how botanicals reacted to different temperatures through experimentation, they turned to cold-distillation to bring out the flavours of their potential cocktail ingredients.

Create the right products, not the easy ones

While other gins coming out of Scotland at the time tended to be earthy and spicy, the team behind Porter's Gin sought to do the opposite. The move toward refreshing and crisp led them to the world of citrus. After experimenting with different types for the better part of a year, they landed on an ancient citrus known as Buddha's Hand. In the words of Ben, this citrus is, "the love child between grapefruit and lemon sherbert."

From award winning bar, to award winning gin

To create the first bottle of Porter's Gin, the team spent a year amassing a library of distillates, slowly tweaking the recipe to match their desired flavour profile. Buddah’s hand is difficult to source, so they relied on Josh to contract farmers in China directly. After having just returned from 5 years in China, he was able to build these connections with his skills in Mandarin. This dedication, resourcefulness, and desire to balance innovation with tradition is what makes Porter's Gin so special.