Ben Branson, the founder of non-alcoholic pioneer Seedlip, has launched a distillery dedicated to producing 0.5% abv spirits that mimic the flavours of aged whisky, cognac and rum.
Called Slyva, the non-alcoholic distillery and maturation laboratory is based at Branson’s home in Essex.
The first product to come out of Slyva is Padauk, a small-batch, vacuum-distilled rye spirit imparted with flavour from different types of wood. It has launched via the brand’s DTC site (rsp: £40/50cl).
Padauk had undergone a process of “sonic maturation” to ape the flavour and appearance of an aged spirit, Sylva said.
The technique is forbidden within scotch but has been used on a small scale in US whiskey distilling.
It involves agitating maturing spirits using sound to speed up the process of imparting flavour from wood.
West African wood padauk, locally sourced bark from Essex and single malt American oak spent barrel staves from scotch whisky maker Nc’nean were used to impart colour and flavour to Slyva’s debut release.
The use of sonic maturation, as well as “vacuum distillation and kiln roasting”, enabled Sylva “to produce aged spirits for sipping with depth, complexity and character,” the brand said.
Coming from “a family of grain growers, woodworkers, inventors and timber merchants” made Sylva “a very special project both personally and professionally”, Branson said.
He added: “I am excited to celebrate wood’s unique and diverse flavours by championing innovative extraction and maturation techniques so we can break new ground on what dark non-alcoholic spirits can be.”
Branson, who sold a majority stake in Seedlip to Diageo in 2019, last year founded Pollen Projects, a venture studio dedicated to creating non-alcoholic drinks.
The studio, designed to be more “hands-on” than an incubator, would create brands that were “premium, disruptive, relevant and meaningful to today and tomorrow’s drinker”, Branson said at the time.
Its first release was Seasn, a duo of light and dark non-alcoholic cocktail bitters.
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