St. Kilian Distillers

German Distillery of the Year 2020 - Berlin International Spirits Competition

Berlin International Spirits Competition 2020 - Double Gold Winner

Berlin International Spirits Competition 2020 - Gold Winner

London Spirits Competition - Distillery of the Year 2020

London Spirits Competition - Whisky of the Year 2020

London Spirits Competition - Spirit of the Year 2020

London Spirits Competition - Best Spirit of the Year By Value 2020

London Spirits Competition - Best Spirit of the Year By Packaging 2020

World Spirits Competition 2020 San Francisco - Double Gold

World Spirits Competition 2020 San Francisco - Gold

Meningers International Spirits Awards 2020 - Gold

St. Kilian Distillers is a German single malt whisky distillery based on the Scottish model, combining decades of whisky know how with German engineering.

With characteristic hand-made Scottish pot stills and a warehouse full of fragrant whisky barrels to put their own slant on their spirits, St Kilian pride themselves on both their premises and their creative, passionate and patient team.

Currently the largest distillery in Germany, they enjoy an idyllic position in Franconian Bavaria nestled in a valley surrounded by meadows and an abundance of fir trees. Their water comes directly from the pure local spring at Rüdenau while peat and barley malt is sourced from contacts willing to supply them due to their connection with Irish Whiskey legend David Hynes.

Dedicated to crafting excellent spirits they spent over 4 and half years experimenting to produce a spirit representative of the vision of the 3 distillery founders, they now continue their mission to produce the finest quality German whisky.

Andreas Thummler at St. Killian Distillers

The name 'St. Kilian' is dedicated to the Irish monk and his brothers who introduced the 'Aqua Vitae' (water of life - a barley spirit comparable to today's 'new make' spirit from whisky distilleries) to the Franconian country.

Interesting Facts

St Kilian use the traditional art of whisky production followed in Scotland and Ireland to this day
Founder Andreas Thümmler, a successful technology investment banker and passionate whisky investor, started the distillery together with Irish whiskey legend David F. Hynes, and Master Distiller Mario Rudolf
Their copper stills were handmade by Forsyths, Scotland, who have been manufacturing them in the same method since 1890
They use more than 90 different types of barrel from all over the world to mature their whisky, allowing you to enjoy their pure fruity distillate
At St Kilian they traditionally burn their whisky twice in their copper pot stills, with the slim neck of the stills giving the whisky produced a particularly soft finish
The St. Kilian Whisky Distillery is blessed with its own source of spring water which according to local folklore even has special healing powers!
The distillery name - "St. Kilian" is dedicated to an Irish monk and his brothers, who more than 1,000 years ago impressed the German people with the miraculous qualities of Aqua Vitae (the water of life)
St Kilian bottles are reminiscent of the two pot stills in which their whisky is distilled.

Cask World's Highlights

Andreas (Andi) Thümmler built Germany’s largest distillery sparing no expense, investing 15m Euros. The result? One of the most high tech, state of the art distilleries in the world. As well as two 6,000l stills it also provides vital employment opportunities and a popular tourist attraction.

Unlike most distilleries yet to produce a 10 year old St Kilian is well financed, able to focus on producing premium single malt whisky and fast track international distribution. Like mine, Andi’s plans are long term - he is already laying casks down with a 20 year plan and offers 100 casks for 1M euro including storage for 20 years for the sophisticated investor.

The driving force behind the brand, Andi understands the New World whisky boom more than most. At St. Kilian he houses an incredible Whisky Room with bottles collected around the world.

Situated in the countryside alongside the small town of Rudenau, the team experiment with different types of cask, presenting the whisky produced in an impressive unique still shaped bottle. Not far from the distillery is what’s known as Bunker City – former NATO bunkers St Kilian use to store some of their casks.

As an entrepreneur, I'd like to be around Andi much as possible. He has an eye on the future and I enjoyed learning from him. One of my favourite of his ideas is his way to give back to the world we take from - for every cask he fills, he plants a seed in the forest. He’s already planted well over 1,000! An eco-friendly act of karma Cask World also plans to adopt thanks to Andi, and one I encourage others to contribute to in some way.

I could tell the team at St Kilian love what they do and feel proud to be a part of such a #whiskyforward enterprise. They buried several casks of whisky as a surprise for Andi’s birthday several years back (he was thrilled) and have even filled casks with Tobacco to add to the whisky’s flavour! Bonkers, well financed, well marketed – well worth investing in!