From cane fields and rolling hinterland to the salt air of the coastline, the Northern Rivers isn't simply where Winding Road Distilling Co. makes its spirits. It's part of what makes them distinctive.

Based in the small village of Tintenbar between Ballina and Byron Bay, Winding Road is a family-run artisan distillery founded by Mark and Camille Awad. After settling in the region in 2009, a long-held dream of creating their own craft distillery began taking shape in 2015, eventually becoming Winding Road Distilling Co. in 2017.

Today, the distillery handcrafts an impressively diverse collection spanning rum, single malt whiskey, gin, vodka and liqueurs, taking a deliberately slow and hands-on approach to production.

Perhaps nowhere is that relationship with the region clearer than in Winding Road's Coastal Cane spirits.

Fresh first-press juice from locally grown Northern Rivers sugar cane is collected, slowly fermented and twice distilled in the distillery's custom 1,250-litre copper pot still. For the matured Coastal Cane Pure Single Rum, the spirit then rests in carefully selected oak barrels, with the warm summers and temperate winters of the coastal subtropics contributing to its development.

The landscape finds its way into the gin too. Citrus and Sea Gin combines nine local, Australian native and traditional botanicals, including native pepperberry, strawberry gum leaf and NSW kelp, creating a contemporary expression inspired by the coastline and hinterland surrounding the distillery.

Then there's the Hinterland Single Malt Whiskey, handcrafted from grain to bottle using seven varieties of malted barley before twice passing through Winding Road's copper pot still and maturing in selected oak casks.

It's patient, small-scale distilling with an unusually strong sense of provenance.

For Mark and Camille, the aim is not simply to make spirits in the Northern Rivers, but to create spirits that express something of the landscape, ingredients and adventurous character of the place they call home.