Last week we headed north to Seattle, on the road for a much-needed “field trip” to visit with clients old and new.

Along the way, we took a left turn off the interstate and headed to Bainbridge Island for a rendezvous with Keith Barnes, one of our favorite studio friends and clients in Washington state.

Now being a creative guy, Keith is into a lot of different things: raising pedigree chickens, collecting early Sci-Fi movie props and restoring old trucks. For example, there is an impressive display of early Hollywood westerns in his office…in Japanese!!

All this is well and good, but there is in fact one collection that Keith has amassed that had great appeal to our Polara Studio crew. You see, he has personally collected over 400 fine whiskeys, some almost 100 hundred years old. His pursuit of this hobby has led to a depth of knowledge and a true passion for all things distilled.

In turn that expertise has led him to create a new business, Bainbridge Organic Distillers. Keith and his son Patrick worked together to build the distillery from the ground up, with all new still equipment and extensive plumbing in a spanking new building. Not only is BOD the only fully organic distiller in the Seattle area, it has to be one of the only truly organic craft distillers on the West Coast.

We got to check out the distillery and the beautiful new Vendome copper alembics and mash tanks, handmade in Kentucky, the Rolls Royce of still equipment.

The Barnes “boys’ control this remarkable operation from soup to nuts, that is, of from the harvest of locally-sourced organic grain to the hand-bottling of the BOD spirits.

If you’re ever up in the Bainbridge Island areas, stop by and have a taste of these great spirits: the vodka has a special hint of citrus and botanicals.

And if you are really lucky, Keith will have released his whiskey which at the time we were there was just sitting in the barrels, aging, getting ready for a taste​ or two.

Afterward we visited Keith in his beautiful home bar, and besides meeting his lovely wife, had a wee dram or two from his amazing collection of Irish, Scottish, Canadian and American whiskeys, not necessarily in that order.

We hope that you enjoy these shots as much as we enjoyed ours.