Technique & Everyday Craft
Nine Distillations, One Unanimous Verdict: Inside The Old G's Rapid Rise
A Black-owned London Dry gin brand has stacked three major competition medals in under two years — and its co-founders say the formula was never a secret.
A 96-Point Score That Left No Room for Debate
Double Gold at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition is not a consolation prize. The designation goes only to entries that earn a unanimous gold-medal score from every judge on the blind tasting panel. In 2026, The Old G Gin hit that mark with 96 points, joining a narrow field of spirits that have cleared the SFWSC's highest bar. The win lands less than a year after the same liquid took Best Gin in Show at the 2025 Las Vegas Global Spirit Awards, where it scored 98 points. A Gold medal at the 2024 Global Gin Masters rounds out the trifecta. Peter Ibrahim, co-founder and head of brand, frames the streak bluntly: "Two major wins in less than a year — that's not luck, that's consistency." For a brand that launched into a crowded London Dry category, the back-to-back-to-back recognition from three separate judging bodies suggests something beyond novelty appeal.
Nine Runs Through the Still, Two Days in the Tank
The production method behind The Old G is deliberately labor-intensive. The spirit is distilled nine times from a blend of organic botanicals — juniper, citrus peel, coriander, cardamom, licorice root, and orris root — before undergoing a two-day aeration period. That extended aeration step is unusual for the category and is designed to strip out harshness, yielding what the brand describes as an exceptionally smooth, clean finish. The botanical roster skews classical for a London Dry but the processing philosophy leans modern: fewer sharp edges, more approachability, a profile aimed at drinkers who might otherwise reach for a vodka or a blanco tequila. Ibrahim positions the gin as a versatile sipping spirit, one that works neat, over ice, or as a cocktail base without losing its balance in any format.
An Artist and an Executive Build a Brand Around a Word
The Old G's identity is rooted in a specific cultural reference. Co-founder Hebru Brantley — a Chicago-born contemporary artist whose work explores imaginative expressions of Black identity — and Ibrahim, a 16-year veteran of global spirits portfolios, built the brand around the concept of the "OG": the cultural forebears who shaped the communities they grew up in. Brantley handles creative direction, bringing his internationally recognized visual language to everything from bottle design to brand storytelling. Ibrahim runs commercial strategy and distribution. The partnership pairs an artist whose work has been collected by prominent institutions and international brands with a spirits executive who has managed product lines across multiple alcohol categories. That dual foundation — art and commerce, culture and craft — gives the brand a narrative foothold that most new entrants in the premium gin space lack.
What Three Medals in Two Years Actually Means for a New Entrant
Industry competition medals are not marketing currency for every brand, but for a young one they function as a credibility accelerant. The San Francisco World Spirits Competition, now in its third decade, is widely regarded as one of the most rigorous blind tasting events in the spirits world. A Double Gold there carries weight with distributors, retailers, and bartenders who track results as a proxy for liquid quality. Stacked against a Best Gin in Show from Las Vegas and a Global Gin Masters Gold, the SFWSC win creates a pattern that is harder to dismiss as a one-off. For a Black and minority-owned brand operating in a category where ownership demographics skew heavily in the other direction, the competitive record also serves a second function: it shifts the conversation from who made the gin to what the gin can do.