Maker's Mark and Lucien Laviscount Team Up to Make the Old Fashioned the Drink of the Moment
Kentucky bourbon doesn't often make its boldest international moves from a train station in London. But that's exactly where Maker's Mark chose to plant its flag for the summer of 2026 — inside the gleaming new Hawksmoor at St Pancras, one of the most storied and atmospheric rail terminals in the world, a place where journeys begin and endings linger over a last drink at the bar. The setting wasn't accidental. For a brand that has spent seven decades arguing that the way something is made matters as much as what it produces, the choice of venue was a statement in itself.
Maker's Mark Whisky announced on June 3, 2026 a collaboration with British actor Lucien Laviscount for a new short film encouraging people to be uncompromising in moments that matter. It's the kind of partnership that looks simple on paper — a heritage bourbon brand, a rising entertainment name, a classic cocktail — but carries considerably more strategic weight beneath the surface when you understand where both the brand and the British on-premise market currently stand.
The Film, the Setting, and the Message
Filmed at the new Hawksmoor in St Pancras in London, the short film sees Lucien reflect on the small everyday shortcuts that people take, before raising a signature Maker's Mark Old Fashioned cocktail to recognize moments that deserve more intention. It's a deceptively straightforward premise — the kind that either lands as genuine or falls flat as a polished ad. Here, it lands, largely because the premise maps so directly onto Maker's Mark's founding philosophy and because Laviscount, known for his role in the globally streamed series Emily in Paris, brings a credibility to the concept that a less culturally specific face might not.
Inspired by Maker's Mark's Perfectly Unreasonable campaign, which celebrates the extraordinary lengths Maker's Mark goes to in pursuit of uncompromisingly delicious bourbon, the short film premiered on Lucien's Instagram @its_lucien. The "Perfectly Unreasonable" framing is important — it's not a new concept for the brand, but the Laviscount film extends it outward, from the production floor of Star Hill Farm in Loretto, Kentucky, all the way into the personal choices a person makes about how to spend an evening.
Laviscount put his own words to the idea plainly. "There's something special about going to a great bar, being with good company and taking a moment to enjoy it properly," he said. "We compromise on little things all day, so when you do get that moment to stop, you want it to feel like it's all worth it. For me, a Maker's Mark Old Fashioned is exactly that: simple ingredients, done properly, with real character."
That last phrase — "simple ingredients, done properly, with real character" — reads almost like a distillery motto. It's the kind of line that, whether crafted by a copywriter or genuinely felt, sits in perfect alignment with what Maker's Mark has been saying since Margie and Bill Samuels, Sr. first set up shop in Loretto in the early 1950s. The short film, social cutdowns, and a companion cocktail-making video were all deployed across Laviscount's personal Instagram channels and the brand's own @makersmark account, with production handled by Firmative and Blank Co and direction by Dumi Siwo.
Rob Samuels and the Weight of Seventy Years
On the brand side, it fell to Rob Samuels — managing director of Maker's Mark and a man who carries the weight of family history into every press release and distillery tour — to articulate why Laviscount made sense as a partner. "Our family legacy is simple: we don't compromise on the details. My grandparents set that standard seventy years ago, and we still honor it today by rotating our barrels by hand, aging our whisky strictly to taste, and hand-dipping every single bottle in that red wax," Samuels said.
Samuels is the eighth generation of his family in the whisky business, a fact that never loses its resonance no matter how many times it's repeated. When he talks about his grandparents setting standards, he means Bill Samuels, Sr. and Margie Samuels, the couple who in 1953 did something that bordered on reckless — they burned the family's original recipe. In 1953, founders Margie and Bill Samuels, Sr. broke from tradition — burning the family's 170-year-old recipe to create a bold, balanced bourbon made with soft red winter wheat for signature sweetness and creaminess. That decision was the founding act of the entire Maker's Mark identity. You don't compromise on the details. You burn everything that compromises them.
"Lucien really understands that mindset," Samuels said. "He values things done the right way, without shortcuts — whether that's making time for the people who matter most or taking the care to craft a proper Maker's Mark Old Fashioned." The endorsement is specific and deliberate. Samuels isn't just saying Laviscount is cool enough to hold a whisky glass. He's connecting the actor's personal ethos — how he approaches relationships, commitments, his craft — to the production philosophy that defines the bourbon in the bottle.
What the UK Market Tells Us About Where Bourbon Is Headed
The strategic context here is worth dwelling on, because this campaign isn't happening in a vacuum. The British spirits market has been undergoing a meaningful shift in consumer behavior, one that premium bourbon brands have been watching closely. The collaboration arrives as UK consumers become more selective about nights out but continue to prioritize quality, with 20% spending more per month on eating and drinking out compared to 2024, driven in part by a desire to celebrate and treat themselves.
That's a meaningful number. People are going out less frequently — the belt-tightening of post-pandemic economics has seen to that — but when they do go out, they're spending more per occasion. The cheap round is giving way to the considered order. This is the environment in which a Maker's Mark Old Fashioned at a Hawksmoor bar becomes not just a drink but a statement about how a person chooses to spend their money and their time. Maker's Mark understands this dynamic perfectly, and the Laviscount campaign is calibrated precisely for it.
The global whiskey and bourbon sector is undergoing a massive transformation, driven by premiumization. Consumers are drinking less by volume but spending significantly more per pour. Maker's Mark, a subsidiary of Suntory Global Spirits, is leveraging this trend by emphasizing its artisanal production methods. That's not merely a marketing observation — it shapes everything from how the brand positions price points to which celebrity faces it chooses and where those faces show up first.
Every bottle remains hand-dipped in the brand's signature red wax, and barrels are rotated manually and aged to taste rather than bound by a strict calendar. This uncompromising approach to production requires a marketing strategy that justifies premium pricing. There's an honesty in that framing. Maker's Mark is not cheap, and it's not trying to be. The partnership with Laviscount serves to reinforce the value of paying more for something made correctly — a message that resonates particularly well with the demographic Maker's Mark is courting on both sides of the Atlantic.
Hawksmoor and the 'Kentucky River': Bourbon Meets British Dining
The Laviscount short film is one component of a broader campaign that extends into a brick-and-mortar activation at Hawksmoor locations across the United Kingdom. Maker's Mark has partnered with Hawksmoor, one of the UK's most celebrated cocktail and restaurant destinations, to offer a custom summer-style Old Fashioned cocktail with Maker's Mark, white cacao, peach and a lemon twist across their eleven London, Liverpool, Manchester and Edinburgh restaurants throughout June.
The house cocktail created for this partnership has been given its own identity. Called 'Kentucky River,' the drink — Maker's Mark Kentucky Straight Bourbon with white cacao, peach and a lemon twist — is available across Hawksmoor's eleven London, Liverpool, Manchester and Edinburgh restaurants throughout June. It's a riff on the Old Fashioned template, loosened up for summer with fruit and cacao notes that soften the traditional bitters-forward structure while keeping the bourbon front and center. The name itself is a nod across the Atlantic — a Kentucky landmark poured into a London glass.
The choice of Hawksmoor as the activation partner matters. The group has long held a reputation as one of Britain's most serious dining and bar destinations, known for its commitment to quality sourcing and technically accomplished cocktail programs. Aligning Maker's Mark with Hawksmoor associates the bourbon with that same seriousness of purpose — the kind of establishment that debates the provenance of its ice as carefully as the provenance of its beef. For Maker's Mark, which built its identity on obsessive attention to process, the pairing is philosophically coherent.
The 'Perfectly Unreasonable' Campaign and Its Larger Arc
To understand the Laviscount collaboration fully, it helps to understand the broader campaign architecture it sits within. The "Perfectly Unreasonable" platform has been Maker's Mark's central brand narrative for some time — a frame that celebrates the irrational, borderline stubborn commitment to doing things the hard way when there are easier options available. From the start, the Samuels went to remarkable lengths to craft uncompromisingly delicious bourbon, a perfectly unreasonable spirit that endures today.
That founding irrationality — burning a 170-year-old recipe, rotating every barrel by hand, aging strictly to taste rather than to a clock — gives the campaign its authenticity. It's not aspirational shorthand dreamed up in a marketing conference room. It describes real, observable behaviors that happen every day at the distillery in Loretto. The Laviscount film extends that logic into the consumer's personal life: if the distillery refuses to cut corners, why should you cut corners on the moments that define your days?
Ultimately, the campaign is a philosophical statement on consumerism in the modern age. In a world defined by speed and disposable experiences, Maker's Mark is selling the concept of time. The painstaking process of crafting the whiskey is mirrored in the careful construction of the cocktail and the deliberate act of enjoying it in good company. That's a sophisticated message to deliver through a short film on Instagram, but Laviscount's presence gives it the cultural fluency to land with an audience that might tune out a more overtly bourbon-forward pitch.
The Production Details Behind the Campaign
The mechanics of how the campaign was assembled are worth noting for anyone interested in how modern spirits marketing works at this level. The campaign's specifics include Katlist as culture agency, with production handled by Firmative and Blank Co, direction by Dumi Siwo, and distribution across short film, cocktail-making video, and social cutdown formats. The culture agency role is particularly telling — Maker's Mark wasn't just hiring a production house. It was hiring a team whose job is to understand where a brand sits within a broader cultural conversation and how to make that conversation feel natural rather than purchased.
Director Dumi Siwo's involvement signals that this wasn't a perfunctory talking-head brand spot. Siwo has built a reputation for visual work that carries emotional weight without becoming overwrought — exactly the tone a campaign like this needs. The short film had to feel like something a person would actually want to watch on a social feed rather than skip past, and the decision to launch it through Laviscount's personal Instagram — an account his actual followers engage with on a regular basis — rather than leading with the brand's own channels, suggests Maker's Mark understands where genuine attention currently lives.
Maker's Mark Beyond the Flagship: A Brand Expanding Its Range
While the Laviscount campaign centers on the core Maker's Mark expression — the one with the red wax that has appeared on bar shelves for decades — it arrives at a moment when the broader portfolio has expanded considerably from its single-product origins. Staying true to its founders' vision, Maker's Mark has expanded its portfolio with award-winning, super-premium expressions, including Maker's Mark 46, Cask Strength, and Cellar Aged, as well as Private Selection, the brand's custom barrel program.
The Private Selection program, in particular, represents one of the more compelling premium bourbon experiences available to serious enthusiasts today — a chance to work with the distillery's stave finishing options and create a custom barrel profile that is, in essence, a barrel-length extension of the same "don't compromise" philosophy the Laviscount campaign is articulating. It's a product that earns its price through genuine craft variation rather than through limited-edition scarcity theater.
In 2025, the distillery debuted Star Hill Farm Whisky, its first-ever wheat whisky. Award-winning and the first to earn Estate Whiskey certification, Star Hill Farm Whisky inspired the Maker's Mark Regenerative Alliance, a bold commitment to advance regenerative farming beyond its business, inviting farms, bars and restaurants to join the movement. The regenerative farming angle is not a green-washing add-on for Maker's Mark — it grows directly from Star Hill Farm itself, the land in Loretto where the distillery has operated for generations. Maker's Mark is proud to be both a B Corp and Regenified Certified company, milestones driven by the sustainability leadership at Star Hill Farm, home of the Maker's Mark Distillery, which strives to be the most endearing, culturally rich, and environmentally responsible homeplace in the world.
That dual identity — handcrafted artisan bourbon on one hand, certified sustainable enterprise on the other — increasingly matters to the consumer cohort Maker's Mark is pursuing with the Laviscount campaign. For drinkers in their late twenties and thirties who are already spending more per occasion and choosing quality over volume, the knowledge that a brand's practices hold up to scrutiny beyond the glass is no longer a nice bonus. It's increasingly a baseline expectation.
The Old Fashioned as Cultural Touchstone
The choice to anchor the campaign around the Old Fashioned rather than, say, a whisky sour or a highball is not arbitrary. The Old Fashioned occupies a particular position in American cocktail culture — and increasingly in British bar culture as well — as the cocktail that rewards patience and proper technique above all others. There is no shortcut to a good Old Fashioned. Rush the stir, use bad ice, reach for a substandard bourbon, and the drink exposes every compromise immediately.
That makes it an ideal vehicle for a brand whose entire identity is built around the refusal to compromise. The Old Fashioned also happens to be, at this particular moment in the global cocktail market, one of the most frequently ordered drinks in upscale on-trade venues. Its resurgence over the past decade — driven partly by the craft cocktail movement, partly by pop culture moments, partly by genuine appreciation for its structural elegance — has made it the defining modern whisky drink in a way that no other serve has managed.
For the home version of the Maker's Mark Old Fashioned, which Laviscount demonstrates in a companion cocktail-making video, the recipe calls for 50ml of Maker's Mark Kentucky Straight Bourbon, 5ml of sugar syrup, two dashes of Angostura Bitters, and an orange peel twist to garnish over a large block cube of ice. The method: add the bourbon to a mixing glass with ice, followed by the bitters and sugar syrup, stir until chilled, strain into a rocks glass over fresh ice, and finish with an orange peel twist. It's a spec that any competent home bartender can execute, which is precisely the point. The ingredients are simple. The margin for error is narrow. The reward, when done correctly, is a drink that tastes like the full weight of the bourbon's character — all that wheat softness, all that oak depth — with nothing extraneous crowding it out.
What This Means for American Bourbon Fans
From an American perspective, this campaign might seem like a specifically British story — a UK market activation, shot in London, timed around Father's Day in the UK, distributed through channels aimed at British consumers. And in its immediate, logistical sense, it is exactly that. But the broader signals it sends about where Maker's Mark is positioning itself globally, and how it's thinking about who the next generation of serious bourbon drinkers will be, translate directly back to American enthusiasts.
The emphasis on intentionality — on choosing quality over convenience, on slowing down enough to build a proper drink and actually be present while you drink it — mirrors a shift happening in American whiskey culture as well. The era of the novelty bottle flip, the allocated-bottle hunt as sport, the social media unboxing of yet another heavily hyped release is not over, but it is being countered by a quieter movement of drinkers who want to actually understand what's in their glass and why it was made the way it was made.
Maker's Mark, more than almost any other major bourbon brand, has a story that holds up to that kind of scrutiny. The wheat mash bill that Bill Samuels, Sr. built from scratch after burning the old recipe. The hand-dipping of every bottle in red wax. The barrel rotation program. The decision to age to taste rather than to a fixed schedule. The decision to build an entirely new bourbon from the ground up established Maker's Mark as a pioneer of the premium bourbon category. For decades, the brand relied on grassroots marketing and its distinctive red wax seal to build loyalty. That loyalty was earned bottle by bottle, pour by pour, through consistency and craft rather than through manufactured scarcity or celebrity flash.
The Laviscount partnership doesn't abandon that heritage. It extends it into a new cultural register — one where a globally recognized face can carry the brand's philosophy to an audience that might not have encountered it before, without the philosophy itself being diluted or rewritten to fit the messenger. That's a difficult balance to strike in celebrity brand partnerships, and it's the one that determines whether a campaign like this has any lasting effect on how people actually think about the bourbon in the bottle.
Father's Day, Summer, and the Timing of Intention
The campaign's arrival in early June is pointed. Father's Day sits just weeks away for UK consumers — and the timing of the Hawksmoor activation throughout June means that the 'Kentucky River' cocktail will be on menus during the precise window when people are already thinking about who they want to celebrate and how. For a campaign built around the idea of not letting meaningful moments slide into mediocrity, the seasonal positioning is well-chosen.
Father's Day has always been a significant occasion for bourbon brands, for obvious reasons. It's a moment tied to male figures, to tradition, to the kind of considered gift-giving that sits naturally alongside a bottle of well-made whisky. But the Laviscount campaign doesn't lean into Father's Day as its primary emotional anchor — it uses the seasonal proximity more subtly, letting the Hawksmoor partnership serve that moment while the short film speaks to something more universal about how any person, regardless of their relationship to the occasion, chooses to spend time that matters to them.
Laviscount embodies this ethos, articulating the brand's core message that certain traditions are worth preserving. That's ultimately what Maker's Mark is selling — not just a bourbon, and not just an Old Fashioned, but an argument that some things are worth doing properly even when the shortcuts are readily available. It's an argument that has served the brand well for seven decades, and one that, judging by both the quality of this campaign and the direction of the market it's targeting, still has a great deal of persuasive force left in it.
How to Join the Maker's Mark Ambassadors Program
For American enthusiasts looking to engage more deeply with the brand beyond a single bottle or cocktail recipe, Maker's Mark operates a formalized ambassadors community. Those who join the Maker's Mark Ambassadors community receive exclusive access, product releases, and other benefits at makersmark.com/ambassadors. It's not a loyalty points scheme or a newsletter subscription dressed up with a title. At its best, it functions as a direct line between the distillery and the people who care most about what comes out of it — the kind of relationship that makes more sense the more seriously you take the bourbon in your glass.
Maker's Mark Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whisky is bottled at 45% ABV — 90 proof — a strength that gives the whisky enough body to carry its wheat-forward character in a cocktail without being stripped of nuance by ice and sugar. It's the right proof for an Old Fashioned in a way that some lighter-bottled bourbons simply aren't. Every detail, down to the proof, reflects the same refusal to cut corners that runs from the founding of the distillery all the way through to a short film shot in a London train station with a British actor holding a rocks glass full of red wax bourbon and American intentions.
