There are moments in the craft beverage world when everything lines up just right. The right people, the right recipe, the right amount of time. What came out of Seattle's waterfront district late in 2025 is exactly that kind of moment — a limited-edition American whiskey that has literally been decades in the making.
Copperworks Kilt Lifter Whiskey is the result of a collaboration between two of Seattle's most respected names in craft drinks: Pike Brewing Company and Copperworks Distilling Co. And when you understand the full backstory, the whiskey tastes even better.
Where It All Started
Pike Brewing Company opened its doors in 1989, setting up shop inside Pike Place Market at a time when the craft beer movement in Seattle was barely getting off the ground. The brewery helped define what Northwest craft brewing would become, and one of the men pouring the early batches was a brewer named Jason Parker.
Image credit: Courtesy of Jason Parker
Parker didn't just brew beer at Pike — he helped create some of its most enduring recipes, including Kilt Lifter, a scotch-style ale that became a signature offering and stayed that way for decades. The beer earned a loyal following for its rich, malt-forward character, the kind of brew that rewards slow drinking and good company.
Years passed. Parker moved on. But he never really left the world he helped build.
Nearly 25 years after tapping Pike's first keg, Parker returned to the Seattle waterfront with a new mission. In 2013, he and co-founder Micah Nutt opened Copperworks Distilling Company just down the alley from Pike Brewing's original location. The two founders — both career craft brewers with more than 30 years of combined experience — built the distillery around a single question: what would spirits taste like if they were made from high-quality craft beer instead of the typical grains and methods used by conventional distilleries?
That question drove everything. Copperworks became a pioneer in American Single Malt Whiskey, distilling from malted barley in traditional copper stills that were custom-built in Scotland specifically for the distillery. The results were good enough to earn Copperworks the title of Distillery of the Year from the American Distilling Institute in 2018, along with a shelf full of Double-Gold medals and scores ranging from 94 to 96 points in major spirits competitions.
But Parker still had unfinished business with that original recipe.
The Collaboration That Finally Happened
About five years ago, Copperworks and Pike Brewing started working on something special together. The concept was straightforward but required precision: take an unhopped version of Pike's Kilt Lifter scotch-style ale — the very recipe Parker had helped develop during his time at Pike — brew it at Pike's historic gravity-fed brewhouse on 1st Avenue using the same specifications as the original beer, and then distill it into whiskey.
Image credit: Copperworks Distilling Co./Kevin Donovan
The mash went into barrels. New American oak casks. And then everyone waited.
For more than five years, the whiskey aged. The wood worked on it. Time did what time does. And when Copperworks finally opened those casks and put the spirit into bottles, they had something worth the wait.
Copperworks Kilt Lifter Whiskey was released on Black Friday 2025, in a limited run of just 1,800 bottles. It came in at 50% ABV and was priced at $59.99 a bottle.
What's Actually in the Glass
The tasting notes on this one are worth reading carefully, because they tell the story of what happens when a great beer recipe becomes a great whiskey.
On the nose, toasted pine and meadow flowers come through first, followed by toffee and custard. It's an inviting combination — not aggressive, not timid. Just interesting.
On the palate, things open up. Baking spice and biscuit arrive early, with steel-cut oats and rich dates coming in behind them. Then caramel sauce and lemon oil. The mid-palate is layered in a way that keeps drawing attention.
The finish brings sweet cinnamon and malt, then folds in coffee cake, dried mango, stewed apple, and just a thread of eucalyptus to keep things from being too straightforward. It lingers without overstaying its welcome.
What makes it distinctive is that you can taste where it came from. The DNA of that scotch-style ale is present in every sip — the richness, the oat character, the dried fruit notes. The whiskey doesn't hide its origins. It celebrates them.
The Passport Trail: A Reason to Get Out and Explore
Copperworks and Pike aren't just asking people to buy bottles and enjoy the whiskey at home. They've built an experience around it.
The Copperworks Kilt Lifter Whiskey Passport Trail is running now through April 30, 2026, across six Seattle-area locations. The idea is simple: pick up a passport at any participating bar, visit all six stops, collect a stamp at each one, and redeem the completed passport for a commemorative Pike Brewing x Copperworks Distilling Co. hat.
Most locations will have both the Copperworks Kilt Lifter Whiskey and Pike's Kilt Lifter Beer available, making each stop a chance to taste the collaboration from both sides — the ale that started it all and the whiskey it eventually became.
The six participating locations are Copperworks Distilling Co. in Seattle, Pike Taproom - Summit, Elliott Bay Brewing in Burien, Madrona Arms, Lady Jaye, and The Pine Box.
One important detail: Copperworks Distilling Co. will have the whiskey but not the beer, and Pike Taproom - Summit will have the beer but not the whiskey. The remaining locations will carry both. Participants who aren't able to get their passport stamped at a particular stop should hold onto their receipts, as those can be used for verification when redeeming.
Completed passports can be turned in at Copperworks Seattle, located at 1250 Alaskan Way, or at Pike Taproom - Summit at 1008 Pine St Suite 431. The deadline is April 30, 2026, and the limit is one hat per person, per passport.
Where to Find the Whiskey
For anyone who wants a bottle of Copperworks Kilt Lifter Whiskey outside of the trail experience, bottles are available online while supplies last, and at Copperworks' two tasting room locations — the flagship at 1250 Alaskan Way in Seattle, and the Kenmore location at 7324 NE 175th St.
Given that only 1,800 bottles were produced, the window is narrow. This is not the kind of release that waits around.
Why This One Matters
Seattle has a deep craft beverage culture, and collaborations between breweries and distilleries are not unheard of. But most of those projects don't carry the kind of history that this one does.
Jason Parker poured his first professional batches at Pike Brewing more than 35 years ago. He helped build a beer that became a Pacific Northwest institution. Then he went on to build a distillery that became one of the most decorated craft operations in the country. And then, when the time was right, he came back to finish what he started.
Copperworks Kilt Lifter Whiskey is what happens when someone has the patience to let a story develop at its own pace. The beer came first. The distillery came next. The collaboration took five years to age properly. And now, with only 1,800 bottles in existence and a trail that runs through some of Seattle's best drinking establishments, the whole thing is available to anyone willing to seek it out.
That's a story worth following — one stamp at a time.
