Bourbon aging warehouses built in Louisville prior to Prohibition (c. 1920) had taken on the form of solid masonry construction, with interior racking systems that supported the roof, allowing for maximum aging capacity.

After Prohibition was repealed (c. 1933) the distilling industry in Kentucky never fully recovered.

While many of the production facilities in Louisville were demolished after Prohibition began, many were destroyed in the 1937 flood. Of the businesses that did survive Prohibition, some grew to command a huge portion of the industry market share.

Because of the decay of buildings during Prohibition, post-Prohibition distillers began replacing what was lost, while also expanding their distilling facilities. Some of the new construction favored concrete or masonry over the less expensive to build wood-framed structures, but all of those new structures tried to replicate the features developed in the earlier aging warehouses.

The last of Kentucky’s distillers’ aging-warehouses were built in the 1960s whiskey boom, the last period of capital expansion for distillers, before the decline of the industry in the 1970s and 80s, which saw the sale and abandonment of many complexes.

A “billion-dollar bourbon boom” created a resurgence in distilling the early 21st century.

The National Register of Historic Places application for the Nelson Distillery

Remnants of early distilleries are hard to find in Louisville. The few that remain provide a glimpse into the evolution of the industry. In Louisville, in the late 1890s, there were 24 distilling operations. Today, only three of those sites have structures remaining from the distilleries of the era.

Of those remaining buildings, only two sites retained bourbon-aging warehouses. From these remains, the architectural evolution of warehouses can be seen in each period of construction.

One of the earliest structures remains at the site of the original Stitzel Brothers Distillery in western Louisville at 25th & Maple St. The advances in aging-warehouse design were refined in later periods, replicating earlier elements on a larger scale.

The Stitzel Bros. built a new warehouse in 1918. This warehouse displays an architectural design that integrates function and production and is eight stories tall. Its exterior is solid masonry, which originally supported an interior racking system.

After extensive remodeling, most of the interior has been removed, while the exterior still provides a good example of the evolution of industry facilities.

Though most of the Stitzel Bros. distillery complex has been demolished, within the four remaining structures the evolution and growth of the bourbon industry in Louisville can be seen.