High N' Wicked Whiskey Co.

High N' Wicked Whiskey Co. is not a distillery in the traditional sense. It is a Kentucky-based whiskey house built around the art of the search: finding exceptional casks of American and Irish whiskey, then finishing, blending, and bottling them under its own name. Founded in 2019 and headquartered around Harrodsburg, Kentucky, High N' Wicked has built a reputation less on a single mash bill than on a point of view, favoring sweet mash bourbon production, long-aged Irish single malts, and secondary cask finishes that range from Madeira to Pedro Jimenez sherry.

History & Heritage

High N' Wicked was founded in 2019 by W. L. Lyons Brown, III and Kevin E. Sachs. Brown is also the founder and CEO of Altamar Brands, LLC, the Louisville-based spirits house that has developed and imported artisanal spirits brands since 2005. High N' Wicked operates as part of the Altamar Brands portfolio, owned, as of July 2026, by Altamar Brands, LLC. The company was built from the outset as a non-distilling producer, meaning its focus has always been sourcing, aging, finishing, and bottling rather than operating stills. Its Kentucky Straight Rye Whiskey is distilled by New Riff Distilling in Newport, Kentucky, then aged and eventually bottled by High N' Wicked in Harrodsburg. The brand's portfolio has grown from two flagship expressions into a running series of Singular Limited Releases, several of which have paired American whiskey with rare Irish single malt and single grain stock, including a 19 Year Old Single Malt Irish Whiskey ("Saints and Scholars II") and a 14 Year Straight Bourbon Whiskey finished in ex-Hungarian Tokaji casks.

The Whiskey

The two core expressions anchor the range. The Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey uses a mash bill of 51 percent corn, 39 percent rye, and 10 percent malted barley, fermented using a sweet mash process rather than the more common sour mash approach. Sweet mashing skips the acidic backset used to jump-start fermentation, which demands stricter sanitation but yields a rounder, buttery sweetness. Grains are introduced in succession, corn first, then rye, then malted barley, to conserve energy and water during production. The bourbon is distilled on an all-copper 36-inch diameter Vendome column still and doubler, aged a minimum of five years in new number 4 char, medium toast American white oak barrels from Independent Stave Company in Missouri, and bottled non-chill filtered. The companion Kentucky Straight Rye Whiskey carries a 91 percent rye, 9 percent malted barley mash bill, distilled at New Riff Distilling, aged five years in new toasted, number 4 char white oak, and likewise bottled non-chill filtered in Harrodsburg. Beyond the two core expressions, High N' Wicked sources and bottles single grain and single malt Irish whiskeys, Tennessee bourbon, and blended American whiskey, with several releases finished in ex-Foursquare rum, ex-Amarone, ex-California Cabernet, and ex-Tinta Negra Madeira casks. Ages across the catalog run from five years on the youngest core releases to twenty years on the oldest limited bottlings.

Why It Matters

High N' Wicked's identity rests on curation rather than distillation, an increasingly visible model in American whiskey where a small team's judgment about which barrels to buy, how long to age them, and what cask to finish them in becomes the product itself. That approach earned outside recognition when Wine Enthusiast named the Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey its Best High-Rye Bourbon of 2023. The brand's willingness to reach past bourbon and rye into aged Irish single malt and single grain whiskey, categories most American sourcing houses leave alone, sets it apart in a crowded field of non-distilling producers and gives The Sentinel Room's Reserve Whiskey Library a genuinely different flavor profile to place alongside Kentucky-distilled staples.

Visiting the Distillery

High N' Wicked does not offer distillery tours. As an independent bottler and non-distilling producer, it has no production facility built for public visits; its whiskeys are distilled at partner sites such as New Riff Distilling and finished and bottled under the High N' Wicked name in Harrodsburg, Kentucky.