2021 Kildare news review: Bono’s whiskey facility ready to open next year

A new whiskey distillery near Monasterevin, in which Bono is an investor, will be ready to open in coming months.

Work is nearly finished on the Church of Oak facility at the historic Ballykelly Mills site.

As well as being a functioning high-end distillery, the €50m attraction beside the Grand Canal also aims to attract visitors and will feature whiskey tasting rooms, a roof garden and an exhibition area.

The distillery venture is being developed by Dublin-based Jewelfield Ltd led by businessman Paddy McKillen and which lists Bono as a shareholder under his real name Paul Hewson.

Locals speculated that U2 frontman Bono may have been visiting the distillery site when he turned up at a Christmas market in Kildare town in early December.

The singer purchased a hand-made Christmas wreath being sold by a stall run by the My Lovely Horse Animal Rescue charity.

The Church of Oak distillery recently hired whiskey-making experts and other skilled workers.

The sprawling 3,578 square metre facility is spread across a two hectare site about ten minutes from the M7.

Distillers are expected to use grain including barley grown by tillage farmers in the local area.

The Church of Oak' name is derived from the Irish translation for Kildare — Cill Dara which means 'church of the oak'.

Bono is following in the footsteps of UFC star and Straffan resident Conor McGregor who launched his own Proper No Twelve whiskey brand in 2018.

The Monasterevin area has a long-established whiskey-making tradition dating back to the 1780s when John Cassidy opened a distillery. The original seven-storey Ballykelly Mills date back to the early 1800s and began as a large corn and flour mill. Grain was brought there for sale and sent to Dublin and also exported to England and Scotland.