Lore Botanicals
A story of trusting the path and creating something that was always waiting to be made
Nestled in the historic town of Leamington Spa, founder Dave Blick has built a distillery rooted in the curious stories the town holds.
In 2018 he began weaving his love of history and the local legends of Warwickshire and crafted a truly local gin. Here’s Dave’s story.
After selling a successful logistics business, I had an amount of time to think about what I wanted to do and noticed a gap in the market for a local Warwickshire gin.
Living in the Leamington and Warwick area for over 25 years I combined my love of local history and the vast volume of little-known stories about the area, to inspire our flavour creations.
The gin that got us started was the wonderful story of elephant trainer Sam Lockhart and his elephants from Ceylon, that he had living with him in the town. They were often seen parading through the town, or bathing in the river Leam.
His elephants entertained Queen Victoria and were kept, at times, in Leamington Spa in the 1880s and 1890s when he was home from his various international shows.
We used Sri Lankan-inspired flavours in the gin and so our Leamington on Parade Gin was born, with cinnamon, chilli, ginger and black tea.
We started our journey not long before the pandemic and actually signed the lease for the distillery 2 months before lockdown, which wasn’t ideal.
The team initially worked from my kitchen and once we had the keys it was a while before we got going, although making 6,500 litres of hand sanitiser was the first thing we made in the distillery.
Our spirits are distilled using a small batch method, in our distillery in Royal Leamington Spa, using a traditional copper pot. We are respectful of the traditional process, yet we are not defined by it. We are politely setting the rule book aside, allowing us to wade into all that is new and undiscovered in the craft gin distilling world.
The team consists of myself and Chloe and Olivia who now operate all the production of the spirits, bottling, labelling, packing, shipping and sometimes delivery. All three of us act as hosts for our three experiences and attend events at the weekend in our mobile pub.
During the week most of the day is spent in the distillery predominantly either in production, planning events, admin or marketing.
One thing we always do is put the kettle on for Vernon Kay’s 10 to the Top (Radio 2), where Olivia and Dave battle it out to get as many questions right as they can, one day they have vowed to try and get on the radio!
All of our drinks are inspired by historical events in Warwickshire but many have global importance. The first tennis club in the world is in Royal Leamington Spa, incredible eh?
In 1860, a Spanish Merchant named Juan Augurio Perera and his close friend, Harry Gem, developed Pelota and Rackets outside. The first game of lawn tennis was played on Perera’s house front lawn ‘Fairlight’ in Edgbaston, Birmingham. In 1873 Perera and Gem moved to Royal Leamington Spa where they formed the world’s first Lawn Tennis Club. To honour the game he called Lawn Pelota, Pelota Dry Gin has Mediterranean citrus tones.
We also have connections to the War of the Roses with our Kingmaker gin. To celebrate The Kingmaker – Richard Neville, The Earl of Warwick – we have used fruits of the forest, which would have been accessible and growing freely in the hedgerows of England at the time of his power.
Fruits such as blackberries, elderberries, raspberries and raspberry leaf, are used to complete our award-winnng Kingmaker and frankincense has been added to create a quite unique flavour.
Another favourite is The Philosopher’s Daughter, a beautiful gin infused with a selection of flavours that have been carefully chosen to honour the Daughter of one of the most revered Philosophers of the Elizabethan age, John Dee. Perfectly balanced with Rosehip Peel, Rose Petals, Apple and Cherries.
We have had many highs and lows already, lows include IP challenges to two of our first three product names, which we had to re-brand, then the pandemic was the big one which changed customer behaviour beyond recognition and still continues to evolve since 2020.
Our highs though are plentiful, from launching new products, supporting other local businesses and supporting community events and charities.
Personally, having a visit from two of Randolph Turpin’s daughters was pretty special, and to learn more about their father and grandfather was just magical.
Our first Rum Pugilist Spice Blended Rum is inspired by Randolph Turpin, who went down in British boxing history for sensationally winning the World Title from the legendary Sugar Ray Robinson, earning himself the memorable nickname The Leamington Licker. Born in Leamington of Guyana heritage, Turpin became a hero overnight!
To commemorate this fabulous son of Leamington we reached to his Guyanan heritage and are using Guyanan rum spirit as our base and adding our special Warwickshire spice blend to create a warming, rich rum that will keep you wanting more.
We make and bottle our spirits on site, we are a huge believer in the local circular economy, using and working as many other local companies as possible.
We are constantly trying to promote not only our products, but others in our local community so we can all thrive and employ more local people and we sell other locally produced brands from our mobile pub, Lockhart’s. The name stays true to its roots, in a nod to Samuel Lockhart.
We have recently launched our ready to drink Gin and Tonic cans which we believe open new markets for us – this is every exciting as the market is dominated by the multi-nationals and I believe there is room for an artisan player in that marketplace.
We also host tasting experiences at our distillery. At the Gin Tasting Experience you can learn all about the distillery process and inspiration behind the company as well as enjoy seven tastings from our gin, rum and vodka range and four complimentary drinks of your choice. You are also entitled to 10% off all purchases from the distillery shop, we’d love to welcome you into our world of gin and local stories and our cocktail experience is ideal for those who wish to try our gins, sample delicious cocktails, and enjoy a great night out with friends.
Thank you for sharing your story Dave and what a perfect way to celebrate the rich heritage of Leamington Spa, and ensure the stories continue to be told. I can imagine you telling the stories as you serve up drinks and can’t wait to hear more curious tales through your creations.
-Lyndsey
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THE ARTISAN FOUNDER SUNDAY NEWSLETTER
A story of trusting the path and creating something that was always waiting to be made
Combining nature & craftsmanship to bring joy to our daily rituals.
