Tucked away on the edge of Edinburgh, The Secret Garden Distillery offers something quieter and more grounded than the city’s usual tasting rooms. It sits in a cultivated pocket of green space, where over 600 varieties of herbs and botanicals are grown, harvested by hand, and used to produce a range of small-batch gins rooted in the surrounding environment.

The experience here is more than a standard tour. Visitors are invited into the process — from the landscaped garden itself to the expanded drying room and newly renovated Sample Bar. Tastings are guided by the distillery team, who offer a thoughtful introduction to the flavours and methods behind each bottle. The gins are natural, unfiltered, and created without artificial additives, with a focus on seasonal expression and botanical clarity.

The range includes traditional London Dry styles as well as experimental expressions, many of which change with the garden. The emphasis throughout is on simplicity and provenance — an approach that reflects the distillery’s wider commitment to sustainability and soil health.

It’s a place where process and place are closely linked. The garden isn’t just a backdrop; it’s the starting point for every recipe. And for those interested in how wild herbs and cultivated plants can shape flavour, it’s an education as well as a tasting.