Premium Scottish Borders Gin

our wonderful BOTANICALS:

Smooth, fresh and delicate – we have loved making this gin and love the way it tastes, we hope you do too.

JUNIPER

This is the foundation of Gin.
Sourced from Europe and dried slowly before being shipped to give it a truly deep, aromatic flavour.

CORIANDER SEED

With its warm, spicy and nutty tones, Coriander is the perfect partner for the Juniper berry. Another staple in any great gin it has amazing character which compliments the flavour

ANGELICA ROOT

It may not look pretty but without this little root the spirit wouldn’t blend as perfectly as it does. It has sweet and musky scents which bind the main ingredients together.

GRAINS OF PARADISE

Peppery, fiery seeds give warmth and heat to the gin, being very potent, a little goes a long way.

LIQUORICE

With its many health benefits, Liquorice also has great flavour which is why it is used in so many confectionery sweets, teas and spirits.

Finely ground into a powder it gives off beautiful aromas and texture to our gin.

POMELO

This is the fruity part. Pomelo has a smell like nothing else; it is citrusy sweet and tangy to the taste. Grown in Vietnam, we cannot do without this incredible fruit.

CLOUDBERRIES

Orange ‘cloud-like’ berries are found in Nordic climates, cold and harsh. It has also grown in parts of Scotland as well, Breadalbane in the Scottish Highlands has a hill called Beinn nan Oighreag which means ‘Hill of Cloudberries’.

It has a unique taste that resembles blackberries and raspberries.

SWEET ORANGE PEEL

Dried on the day of harvest for perfect flavour. Its sweet, zesty and brings in all the citrus botanicals together. It is also our signature garnish when making Rule and tonic.

OUR STORY

Old traditions die hard. Here at Bloodline Spirits we are following in the footsteps of our forebear Andrew Usher and his descendants. Andrew Usher ll was born in 1826 and perfected the blending of ‘Usher’s Whisky’, producing the famous Usher’s Green Stripe and Old Vatted Glenlivet (also known as OVG); he is often referred to as the “father of whisky blending”.

Andrew’s brother, John, joined the company which continued to expand, with Usher’s beer also becoming a best-seller. By the early 1900’s, whisky took over brandy as the leading spirit throughout the UK. The Ushers were one of the first to recognise the enormous opportunities for exporting whisky around the world.

Concerned that the newly formed Distillers Company Ltd (DCL) was gaining a
monopoly of Scotland’s grain whisky production, Andrew Usher became one of three founders of the North British Distillery Company, building a new independent grain whisky distillery in Edinburgh.

The family connections with Edinburgh and the Scottish Borders run deep. Andrew
financed several major public buildings and harbour construction projects in the
Borders coastal village of St Abbs, where he had a home.

He was a lover of the arts and gifted Edinburgh the sum of £100,000 to erect a great hall for music, theatre and performances to be held. Although Andrew sadly died before its completion in 1914, the impressive Usher Hall remains one of Edinburgh’s main venues for the arts today.
John meanwhile helped establish and fund the building for the John Usher Institute of
Public Health at the University of Edinburgh. For this generosity, he was made a baronet in 1899.

The family continued to make vast donations to local hospitals and charities. Sir John’s son, Robert, the second baronet, purchased Hallrule House near Jedburgh, so named from the River Rule that runs through the estate. The name lives on in our Rule Gin.

When Sir Robert died in 1933, the house passed to his son John Turnbull Usher, the
third baronet. Sir John had two girls. The convention of the day held that boys, not girls could inherit. So, on Sir John’s death in 1951, Hallrule passed to his brother, Stuart, now the fourth baronet. Sir Stuart himself had two sons, but neither Peter nor Robert married or had children. The success, power and wealth that the Ushers accumulated, was lost when Sir Peter then Sir Robert died, just four years apart in the early 1990s. With two sets of death duties to settle in quick succession, and with no one to directly take over the last heir’s rights, the family’s estates were sold off and the great Usher family name drew to a close.

Now, with the world in a new era of distilling, spirits of all genres are making a
comeback. From the female line, we decided it was time to rejoin the industry and bring to you our spirit … Rule Gin.

Using the finest ingredients, distilled using our family knowledge, we have handcrafted
our gin within the heart of the Tweed Valley, in our home town of Peebles. Rule Gin is
both modern and traditional, rolled into one. Smooth, fresh and delicate, we wanted our
spirit to be the one people come back to again and again.