Spirits · Diamond, Demerara-Mahaica
Demerara Distillers
Guyana's last working distillery, home to El Dorado rum and historic wooden stills.
- Founded
- 1983
- Based in
- Diamond, Demerara-Mahaica
Making it since
1983
Their story
Demerara Distillers is based in Guyana, where rum making along the Demerara River goes back centuries. Its Diamond distillery sits on a former sugar plantation established in 1753, and today it is the only distillery still operating in the country.
Guyana once had well over a hundred estate distilleries, but they closed one by one. In 1975 the remaining estates were combined under state control, a move led by Yesu Persaud, and in 1983 Demerara Distillers Ltd was formed by merger. The company launched its own El Dorado rum in 1992 and remains publicly owned.
How it's made
Diamond keeps several stills rescued from closed estates, including the Port Mourant and Versailles wooden vat stills and an Enmore wooden Coffey still, designs found nowhere else. Each one produces a distinct style of rum, and the distillery blends and ages them to build El Dorado and other expressions.
Why we carry them
El Dorado is a great way into Demerara rum, rich and full of brown sugar depth. We love that the stills behind it carry the names of long-gone estates.
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