THE CREATORS COLLECTION
Where the heart is
The Creators Collection is a new series from the Society that showcases the liquid art of whisky making and the visual art of illustration. We have curated some of our oldest and rarest whiskies and collaborated to design beautiful labels to create the ultimate in whisky flights. This month we’re launching the Homecoming collection in celebration of our 40-year-heritage and spiritual home, The Vaults, with Leith-based artist Shona Hardie bringing these whiskies to life through four special labels. Mads Schmoll caught up with Shona to find out more about The Vaults, Leith’s whisky history and the inspiration behind her artwork
PHOTOS: MIKE WILKINSON
The Vaults has been through more than a few incarnations in its hundreds of years of history, from its origins as monastic wine vaults, to being home to the Vintners’ Guild of the Port of Leith, and then onto wine merchant JG Thomson’s period of ownership from the early 18th century.
The Society’s role started in 1983 when founder Pip Hills walked up the stairs to express an interest in buying it from JG Thomson. His timing was fortuitous and it subsequently became headquarters for the SMWS and the first of our four Members’ Rooms.
The most recent change to The Vaults happened with a major redesign in 2023, when the bar was moved to its current position and a major new artwork was commissioned. That’s where local artist Shona Hardie enters the Vaults story.
Traditionally a muralist, Shona Hardie tells me she has adapted her approach to work on smaller paintings due to the unavoidable fact that the Scottish climate makes the season for outdoor artwork all too short. For the new painting, Shona took inspiration from Society Tasting Notes and bottle names that were important to the team at The Vaults and part of the legacy of the building. The result was Endless Discoveries, Infinite Adventures which hangs on the wall opposite the bar. Like a complex Society whisky, it demands close attention and an open imagination.
ABOVE: Like a complex Society whisky, Shona’s artwork in The Vaults, Endless Discoveries, Infinite Adventures, demands close attention
Now Shona has taken The Vaults and its place in Leith as the inspiration for the Society’s new Creators Collection, known as Homecoming. The collection includes whiskies from 20-years to 32-years-old, across various flavour profiles. Each one is labelled with an original piece of art created by Shona to reflect a different aspect of our spiritual home – the perfect combination of outstanding whisky and a bottle that’s a work of art in its own right.
So what was it like to go from creating such a large canvas in The Vaults to four much smaller labels for the Creators Collection? “It’s something I do quite a lot in the way that I work,” Shona says. “I work on murals. So sometimes they’re a very large scale, like sides of buildings. But then I also do quite detailed pyrography [creating art with burn marks] pieces. So jumping back in terms of scale and medium is not alien to me.”
PICTURED: Shona Hardie with the Creators Collection Homecoming bottles that feature her artwork
HOME IS WHERE THE HEARTH IS
Her first label, for Cask No. 3.357: Home is where the hearth is, was inspired by the fireplaces in The Vaults, a place where members have enjoyed many drams over the years. “This one went through quite a few iterations,” says Shona. “I came in one evening by myself and sat with my sketchbook and drew the fireplace and drew some people sat around that fireplace. I had a feeling of what it’s like to be here when the members are around and enjoying the setting.” The rest developed organically, she says.
“I wanted to tie in with the building. The entranceway is so cool and iconic. I wanted to tie in the fire and the hearth with that building and I thought the gates could become the fireplace surrounding. But I wanted to keep that warmth too. So in terms of colour that one is the warmest label.”
The whisky from distillery three was selected to bring out feelings around the warmth of The Vaults. Its Lightly Peated flavour profile is a nod to the many fireside drams shared here over the years, many of which will have included Islay peat. Coincidentally, peat is also Shona’s favourite type of whisky. “I’ve been to Islay a few times and that’s where I found the style of whisky that I like,” she says. The label is about capturing the moment of arrival that to so many members is symbolic of a homecoming of sorts. Shona says: “You’re walking through the gates to the warmth at the heart of the building.”
BAR-ROOM BUZZ
At the bar, we talk about Cask No. 38.43: Bar-room buzz which is all about capturing the energy and life of the Members’ Room. “What shows that better than a cheers or a slàinte’ mhath?” asks Shona. “The clinking of glasses signifies friendship. And then there’s a repeat pattern in the background that I swapped around a bit, to create a sense of movement and energy behind it.”
The whisky from Distillery 38 is from the Sweet, Fruity & Mellow profile – selected to bring out the liveliness and energy of the bar over the decades. It reflects community and conversation, liveliness and kinship with both serious conversations and extraordinarily good times. It’s something that Shona picked up on in her use of colour on this particular label. “There’s actually quite a lot of colours in this one, even though they’re kind of faded down,” she says. “That adds the idea of more going on in the room to create more energy.
“It was based on trying to find that sense of friendship and community that you find here in The Vaults...sharing a dram, and hopefully finding more like-minded people and making new friends and in the community The Vaults and the Society creates.”
SNUG AND TOASTY
With the Members’ Room picking up, we head to the snug, a new space created in the refurbishment. With two booths, it is cosy but inviting, the perfect place for enjoying a quiet dram while tucked away from the busy hubbub of the main bar. Cask No. 35.388: Snug and toasty is about creating feelings of nostalgia. There’s familiarity and comfort from the Spicy & Sweet flavour profile, and from the distillery, which is a member favourite.
“It comes back to fire and homecoming and being snug and toasty,” says Shona.
“It’s got a couple of bottles, a couple of glasses that looks as though they’ve been half drunk after a party. You’ve just missed the party. You know that people have had a good time in here. So that was kind of the vibe we were going for – nightcap vibes.”
As we chat through the whiskies, the labels feel more and more sequential. They’re snapshots from the stories of great evenings, followed by the tales that are told the day after and the embellished versions that are spun over the years to come. In the background of the label for Cask No. 35.388: Snug and toasty there’s a barrel, a reminder of the casks that bring everyone to the Members’ Room in the first place.
PICTURED: Mads with Shona Hardie in the snug at The Vaults, which inspired her artwork for Cask No. 35.388: Snug and toasty
SHORE REFLECTIONS
We head down the stairs leaving behind The Vaults and walk to the Shore, a place that is iconic to Leith and featured on the label for Cask No. 76.154: Shore reflections. It also has quite a significance for Shona. “I live in Leith, but I’m not originally from here,” she says. “I’ve lived abroad and in different cities, but I always come back to Leith. That’s what homecoming really means to me. I feel really at home, in this town.”
Leith’s place in the history of the spirits trade is also still visible on many of the buildings on the Shore. “You see little elements of that in the design, but then also the shoreline itself, which I represented by using bottles as some of the buildings.”
The whisky from distillery 76 comes from an ex-sherry cask, a deliberate homage to the Shore and the Port of Leith and its role in the sherry trade. This is where casks would arrive from Spain to be decanted – and subsequently filled with whisky that transformed during maturation in the sherry-soaked wood. Although no longer the hub of industry it once was, there are reminders around the Shore and across Leith of the legacy of the spirits trade here, once a home to over 90 bonded warehouses along with distilleries, cooperages, blending facilities and more.
I wind up our walk by asking Shona what inspires her about the Society. “There’s a sense of community and friendship,” she says.
“The Society’s always trying to do something different, so it was cool for me to explore the ideas and push myself in terms of my illustrative style.”
The Creators Collection is about forging a connection between whisky and art, but it’s also about creating a deeper connection with the Society between these special bottles and our members. The Homecoming Collection is a celebration of tradition. It’s a tribute to the enduring spirit of our heritage and home in Leith and the connections it has created and will continue to create in the future.
The Homecoming Collection will be released on January 29 2025
PICTURED: The full line-up of the Creators Collection Homecoming series, pictured on the steps leading up to the Members’ Room at The Vaults in Leith