Commercial Architecture and Master Planning | Experiential Graphics | Distillery Design | New Construction and Adaptive Re-Use
Louisville, Kentucky
Completed: 2018
AWARDS
• 2019 Kentucky AIA Award Winner
• 2018 Grand Award Winner, Metal Construction News' 2018 awards program
PUBLICATIONS
• World-Architects.com, March 2021, "US Building of the Week"
• Metal Construction News, Nov. 2018: “Dynamic Distillery – “The Rabbit Hole Distillery Takes the Grand Award”
• Louisville Business First, Aug. 3, 2018: “Rabbit Hole Distillery Opens for Public Tours”
• Distillery Trail, August 10, 2018: "Rabbit Hole Distillery Has Just Opened Up Its Urban Bourbon Cathedral to the Public"
• Leo Weekly, May 7, 2018: “Rabbit Hole, Nulu’s newest distillery, is like Willy Wonka’s factory for the 21-plus crowd”
• Wine Enthusiast, April 6, 2018: “Meet the Psychoanalyst-Turned-Distiller Behind Rabbit Hole Bourbon”
• Nightclub & Bar, Jan. 9, 2018: “Falling down the Rabbit Hole to modernize bourbon”
• Insider Louisville, Dec. 5, 2017: “Rabbit Hole: A sneak peek at the Nulu distillery’s progress”
Project Description
The crown jewel of an urban campus in the heart of downtown Louisville, the award-winning Rabbit Hole Distillery is a new, modern, 55,000 SF distillery introduced to an industry steeped in tradition. The architectural innovation is based on transparency and a “form follows process” concept: The structure took shape in direct response to the bourbon production process to showcase both the journey from the grain to bottle and the capacious copper and steel equipment. The building is primarily composed of glass, metal, and blackened wood louvers, the latter of which define the transparent “manufacturing atrium.” The project also repurposed an old warehouse on the site and an 8000 SF ca. 1930 church structure nearby. In 2018, Rabbit Hole Distillery received Metal Construction News magazine’s Grand Award, followed by an AIA Kentucky design award in 2019.
Credits
Architecture and Interior Design: pod architecture + design
Douglas Pierson, design principal and project manager
Youn Choi, design principal
Justin Williams, project architect
Barbora Ngaboyamahina, project associate
Dougald Fountain, project associate
Signage, Wayfinding and Building Graphics: pod architecture + design, PLLC
Photography: pod architecture + design; Rabbit Hole Distilling, PLLC ; Gretchen Bell photography, done by Steve Grider, Cindy Barclay, Prodigy Construction