McConnell's Distillery Tour – Belfast Whiskey Week 2024

Name: Belfast Whiskey Week 2026
Start: 2026-07-24
End: 2026-08-01
Location: Belfast

Filed: 23 Jul 2024
By: Belfast Whiskey Week
Read: 3 min
Ref: BWW/24/708

Few moments in Belfast Whiskey Week 2024 carried quite the same sense of occasion as the McConnell's Signature Distillery Tour. Held on 23rd July, this was an invitation to step inside one of the city's most historically resonant buildings at the very dawn of a new chapter — the distillery had only opened its doors a matter of months before, and guests were among the first people in the world to experience it properly. For £25, it was, by any measure, a remarkable privilege.

About This Event

Book in for a Signature Tour with McConnell's and spend some time in one of Belfast's most historic buildings. Having only opened its doors a few months ago, you will be one of the first in the World to experience this truly spectacular Distillery and Visitor Attraction. It is only a few minutes walk from the City Centre and will last an hour.

Looking Back

There is a particular kind of duchas — that sense of belonging, of returning to something deep in the bone — that Belfast's whiskey revival carries with it. McConnell's Irish Whisky is a name woven into the city's seanchas, its story stretching back to 1776 before the brand was reborn for the modern age. Walking into the new distillery for the first time, that weight of history was palpable. The building itself is a beauty — a few minutes' stroll from the city centre, yet feeling, in the best possible way, like a world apart.

The Signature Tour lasted around an hour, and it was a well-paced, generously informative experience. Guides moved guests through the production spaces with evident pride and genuine knowledge, explaining the craft behind McConnell's approach to distilling without ever tipping into lecture. For those joining their first distillery tour, it was accessible and engaging; for seasoned whiskey travellers, there was enough detail and novelty — a brand-new facility, after all — to hold the attention throughout. The uisce beatha was very much alive and at work in these rooms.

The tasting element — a Straight Whiskey Tasting (SWT) — gave the tour its natural culmination. Glasses raised, a quiet sláinte shared among strangers who'd just become fellow travellers in Belfast's whiskey story. McConnell's whisky is characterful without being showy, the kind of dram that rewards attention. Having just seen where and how it's made, every sip carried a little more meaning. This is precisely the kind of grounded, place-rooted experience that Belfast Whiskey Week exists to create.

It's worth noting that this wasn't McConnell's first appearance in the BWW programme — the brand has been part of the festival family across multiple years, a testament to the enduring relationship between the distillery and the week that celebrates the city's uisce beatha culture. You can explore some of those earlier tours, including the MT19B: McConnell's Signature Distillery Tour and the MT20A: McConnell's Signature Distillery Tour, to trace how the offering has evolved alongside the brand itself. For those who also explored Belfast's wider distilling landscape during BWW 2024, the TT19A: Titanic Distillers Signature Tour made for a natural companion piece — two very different expressions of the city's whiskey renaissance, each worth your time.

If this retrospective has stirred a thirst, the Belfast Whiskey Map is the ideal place to begin plotting your next visit to the city's distilleries and whiskey venues. McConnell's is very much open for business, and the welcome, as we found in July 2024, is as warm as the dram.