Jake Norris built two legendary Colorado distilleries. Now he's doing something nobody has tried before.
There's a short list of people who can genuinely claim they changed the way Americans drink whiskey. Jake Norris is on it.
The man who helped put Colorado on the craft whiskey map — first as the founding master distiller at Stranahan's Whiskey, then again at Laws Whiskey House — is stepping back into the spotlight. And if his track record means anything, the whiskey world should be paying attention.
Norris is working on a new full-scale distillery in Arvada, Colorado, built around small batch craft whiskey production and contract distillation. But that project is still a few years out by necessity. Good whiskey doesn't rush. So in the meantime, Norris and his team have put together something a little different — a limited, carefully structured side project called The Curated Barrel Project, with its first release dropping April 2, 2026.
What The Curated Barrel Project Actually Is
At its core, The Curated Barrel Project is a series of eight quarterly whiskey releases spread across two years. Each one is built on the same foundation: a 7-year-aged high rye straight bourbon, distilled at Southern Distilling Company in Statesville, North Carolina, using a mashbill of 75% corn, 21% rye, and 4% malted barley. That's a recipe Norris developed himself, and the age statement alone puts it ahead of most of what's sitting on liquor store shelves today.
The first release on April 2 will be that base bourbon presented on its own — no finishing, no extra layers, just the whiskey as it is after seven years in the barrel. That's the starting point. From there, every three months, subsequent releases will take that same base whiskey and run it through finishing in exotic casks: rum barrels, cognac barrels, sherry, port, and others. Each release is a one-time thing. When the whiskey is gone, it's gone.
Bottles will be sold exclusively through The Curated Barrel Project's online shop and shipped directly to customers. Buyers also have the option to add tickets to a pairing dinner held at the distillery roughly a month after each release.
Why This Is Different From Every Other Fancy Whiskey Release
Here's where it gets interesting, because Norris isn't just selling whiskey. He's making a deliberate point about what whiskey culture has become — and he doesn't seem thrilled about the direction it's headed.
Norris pioneered the idea of exotic cask finishing in American craft whiskey. When he launched the Snowflake program at Stranahan's, he was the first to use additional cask maturation to layer new flavor into American craft whiskey. That program became famous. It also became something he's now, in some ways, pushing back against.
Snowflake turned into exactly what a lot of specialty whiskey releases become: a thing people line up for, buy, and stash on a shelf. Collectors love it. Norris seems less enthusiastic about that outcome. The Curated Barrel Project is built around the opposite philosophy entirely.
"I think whiskey can be an incredible medium for shared experiences," Norris said. "It can deepen conversations and help to foster authentic connections. Every aspect of The Curated Barrel Project is designed to retrain how people interact with whiskey."
That word — retrain — is doing a lot of work in that sentence. He's not just saying he wants people to enjoy his whiskey. He's saying he thinks the hobby has developed some bad habits, and he wants to correct them.
"Great whiskey is meant to be shared," he added. "It becomes 'real' when it is opened, poured, and experienced together."
"Whiskey should be fun, creative, and communal," Norris continued. "If you treat it like a museum piece, you're missing the point. There's a delicate balance of appreciating the artistry and time that went into producing a well-crafted bottle of whiskey, and using it for its intended purpose, which is for tasting and sharing. Simply put…shut up and DRINK IT!"
That's not marketing copy. That's a man who has spent decades making whiskey watching people collect it like baseball cards, and deciding to do something about it.
The Physical Zine, The Dinners, and the Thinking Behind It All
Every bottle release in The Curated Barrel Project comes with something you don't see attached to whiskey very often: a physical zine. Norris wrote it himself. Each edition contains short articles, stories, tasting notes, and a curated music playlist designed to pair with that particular whiskey. It's analog. It's tactile. It's the kind of thing you read with a glass in your hand.
The pairing dinners take it further. About a month after each bottle release, the distillery hosts a sit-down dinner featuring local chefs. The design of each dinner is specifically intended to get people talking to each other — with additional surprise elements built in to push that goal along. The whole thing reads less like a brand activation and more like something a person genuinely passionate about the ritual of sharing a meal actually designed from scratch.
Taken together — the zine, the dinners, the finite release structure — the project is making an argument. Whiskey at its best is a social object. It's a reason to sit down together, slow down, and have a real conversation. The bottle is just the starting point.
The Team Behind It
Norris isn't doing this alone. His partners include Scott Kerkmans and Nate Grimm, both bringing industry and hospitality experience to the operation. Ryan Carver serves as Executive Creative Director, which explains the level of thought that's clearly gone into the presentation and experience side of the project. The team is also joined by Gene "JB" Salem as project engineer — a man who previously served as master distiller for Destilería Serrallés, the producer behind Don Q rum. That's a serious pedigree on the production side to complement Norris's own.
Together, this group is also the team building out the larger Arvada distillery that will eventually produce its own small batch whiskey and handle contract distillation work for outside brands. The Curated Barrel Project is running alongside that larger effort, giving the team a way to get quality whiskey into the market while the main distillery takes shape.
The Membership and How to Get In
For anyone who wants a guaranteed spot across all eight releases, The Curated Barrel Project offers a membership program. Members are guaranteed access to all eight bottle releases, get first access to sign up for the pairing dinners, and receive a commemorative branded tote bag as part of the package.
Tickets for the first release go on sale April 2, 2026, at 10 a.m. Mountain Time. Bottles are available to ship nationally. Everything runs through the project's website at thecuratedbarrelproject.com.
Given the finite nature of each release, anyone with serious interest would do well to set a reminder rather than assume stock will be sitting around.
What It Means for American Craft Whiskey
Norris has been at the center of Colorado craft whiskey since before most people knew Colorado made craft whiskey. Stranahan's put the state on the map. Laws built on that foundation with a different, grain-forward approach. Both became respected names in a category that has since exploded nationwide.
What Norris is attempting here isn't just another whiskey project. It's a thesis statement about what craft whiskey should be doing that it isn't. The high-end whiskey market has, in his view, drifted toward spectacle and speculation. Rare bottles get flipped for multiples of retail. Releases become events calibrated for social media rather than actual enjoyment. The liquid itself becomes secondary.
The Curated Barrel Project is a counterargument built around a 7-year bourbon and a handmade zine. Eight releases, each one gone when it's gone, each one paired with a dinner designed to get strangers talking to each other over a shared glass.
Whether that argument lands will depend in part on whether consumers are actually ready to drink the whiskey instead of hoarding it. Norris is betting they are. He's spent his career reading what people want from a glass of whiskey, and he's rarely been wrong.
The first pour is April 2. The rest is up to whoever opens the bottle.
