About
Diageo's Dublin distillery, reviving the legacy of George Roe, whose 19th-century Thomas Street distillery was once the largest in the world. Built in the former Guinness Power Station at St. James's Gate. A premium visitor experience and working distillery producing Roe & Co blended Irish whiskey. Diageo's flagship investment in the Irish whiskey revival.
Production Details
The Roe & Co Tale
The River Liffey curves through Dublin's heart, carrying centuries of stories past the cobbled quays and Georgian facades. Here in the shadow of the Guinness brewery at St. James's Gate, where Victorian industry once powered an empire of stout, something remarkable has taken shape. In 2019, Diageo breathed new life into the former power station, transforming brick and steel into Ireland's newest distillery—one that reaches deep into the past to forge its future.
This is the resurrection of George Roe, the forgotten giant of Irish whiskey. In the nineteenth century, his Thomas Street distillery sprawled across seventeen acres of Dublin, the largest whiskey operation on earth. When the world spoke of Irish whiskey, they spoke of Roe. Then came partition, prohibition, and decades of decline that reduced Ireland's whiskey industry to near-extinction.
Now, where turbines once generated electricity for brewing, copper stills catch the light streaming through industrial windows. The water flowing through these vessels is Dublin's own—the same municipal supply that courses through the city's veins, connecting this modern operation to the urban landscape that surrounds it. There's poetry in that choice, using the city's water to revive the city's whiskey heritage.
The stillhouse hums with quiet purpose. Steam rises from gleaming copper, carrying with it the ancient alchemy of grain transformed. This is uisce beatha—the water of life—being born again in a place where industry and tradition converge. The building itself tells the story: Victorian engineering repurposed for Irish whiskey's renaissance, Diageo's flagship investment in a category they're helping to resurrect.
Outside these walls, Dublin bustles with the energy of a capital city. Inside, time moves to the rhythm of distillation, measured not in hours but in the patient accumulation of character. The ghost of George Roe would recognize the essential work happening here, even as the city has grown up around his legacy.
The stills will run, the whiskey will age, and Dublin will reclaim its place in the story of Irish whiskey—one drop at a time.