Four Roses Distillery LLC

Four Roses runs ten distinct bourbon recipes through a single distillery in Lawrenceburg — two mashbills and five proprietary yeast strains, each combination aged separately, each carrying its own four-letter code (OBSV, OESQ, and so on). That's not marketing copy. It's the production reality and the reason a Single Barrel from this distillery can taste like a different category than the Small Batch on the same shelf. Master Distiller Brent Elliott has held the role since 2015, succeeding the much-mythologized Jim Rutledge. Elliott — University of Kentucky chemistry degree, ten years working under Rutledge before the promotion — was named Whisky Magazine's Master Distiller/Blender of the Year and runs the blending decisions on every annual Limited Edition. The distillery itself is the other story. Built in 1910 in Spanish-Mission style — cream stucco, red-tile roofline, arched doorways — it's registered on the National Register of Historic Places as "Old Prentice Distillery" and looks like nothing else in Kentucky bourbon country. Local lore holds it was meant to evoke a California mission. The result is the only major bourbon distillery in the state where the first photo you take looks more like Santa Barbara than Bardstown. ## What people say about the bottles The headline release every year is the Limited Edition Small Batch Barrel Strength, an annual blend Elliott curates from select recipes at higher ages. The 2024 release scored 92 at Whisky Advocate (David Fleming, …