It’s not every day that you get a distillery inspired by the plague, although that was exactly the inspiration behind Lickerish Tooth. Oh, and Guys and Dolls. The plague and Guys and Dolls. We have some explaining to do.

Let’s begin in Egton in 2015, where one evening, while listening to Guys and Dolls the line ‘Standing there, gazing at you, with a sheep’s eye, and a lickerish tooth’ was sung. In that moment, Ste Donnelly, Tracey Donnelly and Peter Thompson knew what the name of their brand was going to be, and they also named their first gin Sheep’s Eye to keep with the theme.

Back to the plague, the trio also had an intrigue in the history of the illness and the quirky ways which doctors tried to cure it. Plague doctors were referred to as a ‘Mask'd Peste’, and they worse a mask that looks eerily like a bird, with herbs and spices in the beak of it to supposedly prevent infection. It was these herbs and spices that served as the starting point for the ingredients for the drinks, and each bottle has the distillery’s Mask'd Peste logo on it, as well as a lucky toad. Oh, yeah, during the plague doctors would also wear a toad around their neck, as they believed this would also fight off the disease, so each bottle has its own lucky toad around its neck!

The distillery was fully launched in the beginning of 2016, and is based in an old cow shed in Egton in the North Yorkshire Moors.