Mackmyra

Type: Distillery and brand

Fifty metres beneath the surface, Mackmyra’s casks matured in the Bodås mine. Above ground, its ambitions rose to a seven-storey distillery in Gävle. Founded in 1999 by eight engineering friends, the Swedish whisky producer built its name on Swedish oak, peat and juniper smoke, unusual cask treatments and a human-curated AI whisky. Bankruptcy in 2024 brought a change of ownership and an unresolved question about the return of distilling.[1][2][5][6][8][10]

Fact box

Checked against the supplied fact sheet in November 2026. Equipment and visitor facilities below describe the historical record, not confirmed present operation.

From a cabin question to a distillery

Eight friends arrived at a mountain cabin in Sälen in 1998, each carrying whisky. According to Mackmyra’s history, the friends had studied engineering together, and their shared choice of drink prompted a question: why was there no Swedish malt whisky? The company followed the next year.[1][2]

Trade reporting identifies the founders as former students of the Royal Institute of Technology. They approached whisky through experiment. Between 1999 and 2002, their pilot distillery produced more than 170 recipes; the first 30 litre cask was filled in 2000.[8][9]

Mackmyra took its name from the village and manor. Its first full-scale pot still distillery, Mackmyra Bruk, made its first spirit in 2002 and opened that October. The cabin question had become a working distillery.[9]

Story box: Eight friends and a Swedish whisky question

• Founding story: Mackmyra places eight engineering friends in a Sälen cabin in 1998, each having brought whisky. Their question about Swedish malt whisky led to the company established on 18 December 1999.[1][2]
• Turning point: On 19 August 2024, the board filed for bankruptcy at Gävle District Court. An acquisition followed on 1 October 2024.[4][5]
• Key person: Magnus Dandanell was one of the eight founders and was identified as CEO in the producer’s 2019 anniversary account.[2]
• Documented record: The cabin story comes from the producer; trade publications separately report the bankruptcy and acquisition.[1][4][5]
• Claim and verdict: The company grew from the friends’ cabin discussion about Swedish malt whisky. Documented, as classified in the supplied fact sheet.
• Evidence gap: No contemporary account of the 1998 meeting appears in the supplied record.
• Earliest known source: The supplied record does not establish the earliest telling.
• Sources and claim mapping: Cabin account: https://www.mackmyra.se/var-historia. Establishment date and Dandanell: https://www.inderes.dk/en/releases/mackmyra-svensk-whisky-turns-20. Bankruptcy: https://www.whiskymag.com/articles/mackmyra-files-for-bankruptcy/. Acquisition: https://www.thespiritsbusiness.com/2024/10/mackmyra-distillery-saved-from-bankruptcy/.
• Last checked: November 2026; exact day unverified.

What Mackmyra is known for

Local peat, juniper and Swedish oak gave Mackmyra a distinctly Swedish vocabulary. The producer describes malt smoked by hand with local peat and juniper, while the Gravity account records separate silos for unpeated and peated barley. Swedish oak appeared early, including in Preludium 02.[1][8][9]

The six Preludium releases, bottled in 2006 and 2007, offer a compact introduction to its experiments. Documented: Preludium 01, billed as the first Swedish single malt, sold out in 20 minutes in 2006.[9] Preludium 04 matured entirely in the Bodås mine and used champagne-seasoned Philipponnat casks. Preludium 06 used malt smoked with Swedish peat and juniper.[9]

Cask seasoning took the experiments further, bringing in cloudberry wine, birch sap wine and Japanese green tea. The producer describes Kaizen whiskies finished in Oloroso tea-seasoned casks for two years and nine months. These descriptions record production choices, not tasting observations for this article.[3][6]

Svensk Ek, Svensk Rök, Mack, Myra and Brukswhisky all appear in the published catalogue. They are useful names to recognise, although the supplied record does not establish a current core range for November 2026.[3]

Gravity, Bruk and the underground warehouse

Gravity put whisky production inside a seven-storey concrete tower. Mackmyra describes it as 35 metres high; the published equipment account records two Scottish copper pot stills made by Forsyths of Rothes, with narrow necks and no reflux bowls.[2][8]

Its chronology has two distinct elements. Whisky Advocate dates construction to 2010, while Whisky.com and Whisky Auctioneer place the production move in 2011. Gravity timing is Disputed in the fact sheet: construction and the transfer of production should remain separate rather than becoming a single opening date.[6][8][9]

The old Bruk site later returned as a Lab distillery, where the producer dates the start of gin making to 2017. Mackmyra had also been maturing casks in the Bodås mine since 2004, taking its whisky 50 metres underground.[1][3][9][10]

Published descriptions place a tasting room at the top of Gravity’s tower and a restaurant within the site called Mackmyra Whiskyby. Anyone considering a visit should check the official website for booking, accessibility and age conditions rather than treat those descriptions as confirmation of current access.[3][8]

Production timeline

Angela D’Orazio and the AI whisky

The human behind Mackmyra’s AI whisky had helped shape its spirit for years. Angela D’Orazio spent two years on an outside sensory team before joining in 2004, according to trade reporting. She served as master blender for 17 years, leaving at the end of 2021. In 2025, she became director of whisky making at Compass Box.[6][11]

Mackmyra developed the 2019 whisky with Fourkind and Microsoft. Documented: Microsoft calls the process “AI-generated, but human-curated”. The algorithm shortlisted five recipes; D’Orazio chose recipe number 36 and selected the cask herself.[2][10]

Software supplied possibilities, not an autonomous whisky maker. The final recipe and cask decisions belonged to a blender whose work on Mackmyra’s house style long predated the project. That division of labour is the most useful way to understand the collaboration.[10][11]

Bankruptcy, acquisition and the production question

Mackmyra stopped production in July 2024, before its bankruptcy filing. Former CEO Patrick Björsjö told SVT that the company had already applied the brakes. On 19 August, the board filed its petition at Gävle District Court.[4][7]

Lennart Hero and No.1 Capital AB completed an acquisition on 1 October 2024, The Spirits Business reported. Hero was a former board member, main shareholder and largest lender. The transaction establishes who acquired the business then, rather than its complete ownership structure today.[5]

By May 2025, staffing had fallen from 59 at the bankruptcy to 11, according to SVT, with Glenn Ström as the new CEO. Hero died on 5 July 2025; subsequent trade reporting said Ström and No.1 Capital AB continued in charge.[7][12]

Private cask holders faced a separate consequence: after the bankruptcy, they found that they did not own the casks. Trade reporting also said Swedish alcohol law prevented their removal, although the legal basis requires verification.[6]

The unresolved issue is new spirit production, not whether work continued on existing whisky. The CEO planned a restart for the end of May 2025. Yet an August 2025 report described 14 people bottling and ageing existing stocks and said it was unclear when new whisky would come. The producer now says it produces at Gravity. The restart remains Disputed and is not reliably established.[1][7][12]

Three common misunderstandings

Bankruptcy did not make the Mackmyra name disappear permanently. The October 2024 acquisition is documented, and the producer subsequently identifies the business as part of No.1 Beverage Group. Resumption of every former activity remains a separate question.[1][5]

The AI whisky was not a machine’s unaided creation. D’Orazio selected the recipe and cask from the algorithm’s proposals. Microsoft explicitly describes human curation, a central part of the process rather than a footnote to the technology.[10]

Mackmyra did not use only 30 litre casks. Small casks feature prominently in its history, but D’Orazio worked with sizes ranging from full size down to 30 litres. Preludium 05, for example, first matured in 200 litre ex-bourbon casks.[6][9]

Where to go next

• High Coast: continue with another Swedish distillery profile.
• Stauning: explore a Danish producer.
• Kyrö: turn to a Finnish distillery profile.

Sources

1. Mackmyra Svensk Whisky. Mackmyras Historia: Svensk Whiskyinnovation Sedan 1999. Producer’s account, undated. https://www.mackmyra.se/var-historia
2. Mackmyra Svensk Whisky via Inderes. Mackmyra Svensk Whisky turns 20. Producer’s account, 2019. https://www.inderes.dk/en/releases/mackmyra-svensk-whisky-turns-20
3. Mackmyra Svensk Whisky via Cision. Mackmyra släpper den andra jubileumsutgåvan: 1999 Vision. Producer’s newsroom account, 2024. https://news.cision.com/se/mackmyra-svensk-whisky/Index/rethinking-care-sweden-ab-m
4. Whisky Magazine. Mackmyra files for bankruptcy. 2024. https://www.whiskymag.com/articles/mackmyra-files-for-bankruptcy/
5. The Spirits Business. Mackmyra Distillery saved from bankruptcy. October 2024. https://www.thespiritsbusiness.com/2024/10/mackmyra-distillery-saved-from-bankruptcy/
6. Whisky Advocate. Mackmyra, Sweden's Premier Distiller, Files For Bankruptcy. 2024. https://whiskyadvocate.com/Mackmyra-Distillery-Files-For-Bankruptcy
7. SVT Nyheter. Oro för Mackmyra whisky: anställda har slutat och produktionen står still. May 2025 reporting, as recorded in the fact sheet. https://www.svt.se/nyheter/lokalt/gavleborg/oro-for-mackmyra-whisky-anstallda-lamnat-och-produktionen-statt-stilla
8. Whisky.com. Mackmyra Distillery. Undated reference account. https://www.whisky.com/whisky-database/distilleries/details/mackmyra.html
9. Whisky Auctioneer. A Collector's Favourite: Mackmyra Preludium. Undated historical account. https://whiskyauctioneer.com/news/collectors-corner/collectors-favourite-mackmyra-preludium
10. Microsoft Source EMEA. The story behind the world's first AI-created whisky. Account of the 2019 project. https://news.microsoft.com/source/emea/features/the-story-behind-the-worlds-first-ai-created-whisky/
11. Whisky Advocate. Angela D'Orazio Moves From Mackmyra to Compass Box. 2025. https://whiskyadvocate.com/Angela-DOrazio-Named-Compass-Box-Creative-Director-of-Whisky-Making
12. Whisky Monkeys. Another Blow for Swedish Distillery: Whisky Maker's Owner Suddenly Passes Away. 2025. https://whiskymonkeys.com/en/news/another-blow-for-swedish-distillery-whiskey-makers-owner-suddenly-passes-away

This article is desk research based on the supplied verified fact sheet, separating producer accounts from trade and press reporting.

Last checked: November 2026