Women in Whiskey Bring Back a Lost Art

Blaise Kelly, national sales and marketing director (L), and Louise McGuane, founder (R), of Chapel Gate Whiskey Company. John Kelly

On a family farm in a small village in Ireland, Louise McGuane is leading the world’s only all-female Irish whiskey company in resurrecting the art of whiskey bonding.

The practice of sourcing whiskey from third-party distilleries, maturing it, and then custom-blending it once lent a huge variety of flavors and styles to Irish whiskey, but died out in the 1960s. The Chapel Gate Irish Whiskey Company, founded in 2015, is Ireland’s first bonder in 50 years.