Marc Christensen founded Dented Brick DistilleryⓇ in Salt Lake City, which sells award-winning, premium handcrafted spirits using its own on-site artesian well water, but that barely scratches the surface of the distillery’s incredible story tracing back to Utah’s first distiller on record, Hugh Moon, who produced rye whisky for the Mormon pioneers when he traveled from Nauvoo, Illinois, to Salt Lake City.
Christensen grew up in Idaho’s wine country leadng to his life-long affinity for wine and spirits. He attended the University of Utah with the intention of returning to Idaho after graduation and working in the wine industry, but his path took a different turn. An invention of his led to a successful barricade business, but over time, he yearned to open a distillery.
One day over cocktails, a friend suggested he take over running the barricade company while Christensen pursued his dream of opening a distillery. Christensen accepted this friend’s offer and today, the friend runs the barricade company, and he’s also part owner in the distillery.
Christensen went to distilling school and spent a lot of time in Kentucky, where he became very close friends with distillers from Kentucky-based Buffalo Trace Distillery. “Some of the guys who work on the floor took me under their wing and showed me how to do what we need here [at Dented Brick], way above and beyond what I learned at distilling school,” said Christensen.
In 2014, Christensen began looking for a piece of property to build a distillery in Salt Lake City. After a lengthy search, his realtor finally found the perfect property—on the land sat a little brick house with well drilling rigs scattered about.
The seller had been a well-driller and expert at artesian wells, and there was a 280-foot artesian well on-site. The well has strictly ground water pressure, and with 28-feet of head pressure, the artesian well can shoot water 28-feet in the air, 24/7, explained Christensen.
“That is the beauty for us, the water doesn’t have any chlorine, fluorine, bromine, or any of the city chemicals that you get in city water that interfere with fermentation.”
The water from the artesian well has very similar mineral content to Kentucky spring water, making the water a homerun for the distillery and its bourbon concept. “A lot of the flavors and the body in our spirits are due to the well water, and the interaction with the yeast and the esters created by the yeast during fermentation—it’s a pretty big deal.”
Changing the name to ‘Dented Brick’
Before Christensen tore down the brick house to erect the distillery in its place, he and his investors walked through the old house and someone discovered that a lot of the bricks on the front of the house had bullet holes. Intrigued, they conducted research and learned that one of the well drillers named Ron Larsen, was in a shootout on the front porch, and was shot and killed.
The distillery was originally named Salt Lake Distillery, but in honor of Larsen, the name was changed to Dented Brick Distillery. Rumor has it that to this day, the ghost of Larsen walks the halls of the distillery, which has become a popular location for paranormal investigations and ghost tours, especially in October.
(Dee & Cory Productions) | For Dented Brick Distillery.
Building a distillery for barrel-aging
Unlike a rented warehouse, the custom-designed distillery was built from the ground-up and the building is extremely safe. Christensen obtained a variance from the city—he didn’t want to install any insulation or heating or cooling in the main part of the building because he wanted to age his whisky on-site, and whisky barrels need to cycle temperature. Christensen explained that barrel-aging requires the natural shifts in temperature that occur with the changing of the seasons, without heating and air conditioning interrupting the process.
Dented Brick officially opened its doors in March of 2016, and most of the bricks from the old house were carefully preserved and built into the new distillery. “Some of the bricks with bullet holes are built into the entryway of the distillation chamber, and we built the retail counter from the bricks from the original house.”
Christensen also discovered that a distiller named Hugh Moon once owned the property. Moon was a distiller from Liverpool, England, and his family was the first to convert to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from overseas.
Moon and his family first settled in Nauvoo, Illinois, where he sold whisky to the people of Nauvoo, but they moved with Brigham Young to Salt Lake City. Today, a lot of Moon’s descendants are very supportive of telling his story, and recreating his labels, said Christensen.
Premium and craft product line
Dented Brick has two product lines—a value (craft) line and a premium line, and each line has vodka, gin, rum, and whisky, and they have specialty products.
The premium line includes the Roofraiser VodkaⓇ, Moon’s BestⓇ 100% Rye Whisky, Antelope Island RumⓇ, and the Antelope Island Red RumⓇ, with their specialties being the Pineapple, Passion Fruit and Disco-Nut Coconut Glitter Rums made with “edible glitter.” Additionally, Dented Brick is excited to be working on a super-premium line. They are also collaborating with a distillery in Mexico to start bringing in bulk tequila, which Dented Brick will bottle on-site.
Dented Brick’s tours and tastings
Christensen said that most people don’t know much about the distillation process; however, Dented Brick’s tour, followed by a tasting, is a great educational opportunity for people to see the grain-to-glass process where it goes from raw grain, to the mill, to the mashing, to fermentation, to distillation. At the end of the tour, people can do a tasting and see what flavors come from what, he said.
The distillery is one of the larger ones in town, which is one reason people are so impressed by the grandeur of the facility. “They don’t realize how big we really are. They come into our little retail store, I open the door to the main floor and they say, ‘Wow!”
Dented Brick is a proud vendor and the spirit sponsor of the first annual Salt City Wine & Dine event on August 27 at the 20-acre La Caille Estate, an event presented by The Salt Lake Tribune. At this extraordinary event, Dented Brick will showcase its products to a broad audience, connect with attendees, and encourage them to visit the distillery for a tour and tasting.
For more information about the distillery’s tours, tastings and products, contact Dented Brick directly. To purchase tickets for the event, click here.