Arrowtown Distillery's best gin win
Arrowtown Distillery Rifters has won the World’s Best Navy Gin award at the prestigious World Drinks Awards in London.
Born from a dream between two Central Otago builders, Rifters has quickly grown into one of Aotearoa’s distilling success stories.
Founders Stuart Clark and Hamish Bourke first dreamed up the idea in 2020 while building in Stu’s backyard shed. Fast forward a few years, and that shed is now home to Arrowtown Distillery — a tight-knit, family-run operation producing award-winning small-batch spirits.
Joining the duo is Kate Clark, Stu’s wife and Philip Riley - Rifter's General Manager and all-rounder who helps lead the charge across operations, strategy and flavour.
Together, the team has taken a passion project and turned it into a globally recognised brand, bringing home the ultimate navy strength title, as well as a collection of gold medals for their premium gins.
“It’s honestly pretty surreal,” says Stu. “To win World’s Best Gin is an incredible moment — especially knowing how tough the competition is out there. We’ve always believed in the product, but this level of recognition is a real milestone for the whole team.”
The winning gin? Rifters Royal, a bold 57.7% navy-strength drop with notes of grapefruit, sweet liquorice root, pink peppercorn and a smooth bay leaf finish. It also took out a Gold Medal and was named Best in New Zealand at the same awards.
And the accolades didn’t stop there — Rifters Original Dry Gin also struck gold, while multiple other Rifters entries were awarded several more medals at the International Wine & Spirits Competition (IWSC) in London last week.
“Every bottle we make is infused with what we love about this place — the mountains, the botanicals, the wildness,” says Philip. “That connection to the land is at the heart of everything we do.”
Sustainability plays a big part in Rifters’ philosophy. The team is proudly single-use plastic free, uses water-based inks on packaging and bottles are crafted from recycled glass — all to help preserve the stunning environment they call home.
With a strong ethos of keeping things real and local, the distillery continues to craft its spirits in small batches, with help from family and friends who pitch in with bottling, labelling, dispatch — and, of course, the occasional taste test.
The name Rifters pays tribute to the original gold-seeking pioneers of Arrowtown — the dreamers and diggers who ventured into the mountain rifts in search of the elusive gold nugget. Today, the Rifters team is doing just that, only this time with locally foraged botanicals and copper stills.
“And we’re just getting started,” says Stu.
