Every bottle of Bushmills carries the date 1608, which is true in the way that origin stories are often true -- directionally, if not precisely. In that year, King James I granted a licence to Sir Thomas Phillips to distil whiskey in the area, using language that reads like a seventeenth-century contract: permission to "make, drawe, and distil such and soe great quantities of aquavite, usquabagh and aqua composita" within the territory of the Route in County Antrim. But the distillery company itself was not established until 1784, by Hugh Anderson. The tradition of distillation in the area may stretch back further still. One account has Sir Robert Savage of Ards fortifying his troops with "a mighty drop of acqua vitae" before battle as early as 1276. What is certain is that whiskey and this stretch of coast have been intertwined for longer than most records can trace.

The history of Bushmills is not a smooth story of unbroken production. The distillery has closed and reopened several times. A fire in 1885 forced a major rebuild, after which the distillery settled into approximately continuous operation. Ownership has changed hands repeatedly -- from the original Anderson family through various corporate incarnations. In November 2014, Diageo traded the Bushmills brand to Proximo Spirits in exchange for the remaining fifty percent of the Don Julio tequila brand, a deal that swapped Irish whiskey for Mexican tequila at the corporate level while changing nothing about the water, the barley, or the people actually making the spirit. In April 2023, Bushmills opened a second distillery, the Causeway Distillery, expanding capacity while keeping its roots on the same Antrim coastline.

Bushmills produces a range that moves from accessible blends to aged single malts of considerable complexity. The Original -- sometimes called White Bush -- is a blend with grain whiskey matured in American oak. Black Bush, the best-known expression, increases the proportion of malt whiskey and ages it in former Spanish Oloroso sherry casks, giving it a richness that has earned double gold medals at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition. The single malts extend to 10, 12, 16, and 21 years of age, each finished in different cask types -- Marsala wine, Port, Madeira -- adding layers of flavor that reflect the distillery's long relationship with the European wine trade. The 21-year-old is produced in limited quantities each year, spending its final two years in Madeira casks, and represents the pinnacle of Bushmills' craft.

Bushmills sits between two of the most famous landmarks on the Antrim coast: the Giant's Causeway to the north and Dunluce Castle to the west. The village takes its name from the River Bush, and the distillery takes its water from Saint Columb's Rill, named for the same sixth-century monk who gave his name to the cathedral in Derry. The connection between place and product is not just marketing. The mineral character of the water, the Atlantic air that moves through the warehouses, the temperature fluctuations of a coastal climate -- all shape what ends up in the glass. For the visitors who walk through the distillery, the appeal is partly the whiskey and partly the landscape that produces it: a coastline where the stone is volcanic, the weather dramatic, and the tradition of making strong drink from local grain goes back to a time before anyone thought to write it down.