THE GIN PASSPORT ATLAS - DISTILLERY STORY- PINNED ON THE MAP - UK/ EUROPE
CYGNET GIN, Wales, UK
Cygnet is probably one of the more complicated celebrity-gin stories because there are really two histories here: the Cygnet that existed before Katherine Jenkins, and the Cygnet that she subsequently built. The distinction is easy to miss now because the current brand's story begins with Katherine, her Welsh roots and her search for a gin that wouldn't irritate her vocal cords. Dig a little deeper, though, and there was already a Cygnet gin being made in Swansea before she arrived on the scene.
The original Cygnet Distillery was established in Swansea in 2018, with master distiller Dai Wakely at its centre. Dai developed the early Cygnet gins and was closely involved with the brand during those first years. In 2021, Katherine discovered the existing Cygnet, described at the time as a little-known Welsh spirit being made just six miles from where she grew up.
What followed was effectively a new chapter: Katherine and Andrew Levitas developed and relaunched the brand, refining the existing Welsh Dry Gin while creating Cygnet 22 and completely reworking the presentation.
That earlier Cygnet is now surprisingly easy to overlook. Unless you remember the original bottle, or happened to be following the brand before the Jenkins era, you could quite reasonably assume Cygnet began with the celebrity launch.
The old bottle tells a rather different story. It was a distinctive ceramic bottle, hand-signed and numbered, with Welsh imagery and a little swan. It looked like something from a small independent Welsh distillery rather than the luxury brand it has become, and there was a genuine Swansea craft-distilling story behind it.
I find that part of the story worth keeping because it is increasingly absent from the way Cygnet is presented today. Katherine has undoubtedly taken the brand somewhere very different, and the current packaging, sustainability work and Cygnet 22 are very much part of her vision.
Yet there was a bottle, a distillery and a distiller here before the celebrity story began.
Dai Wakely and that original Cygnet, are part of the brand's history, whether or not they feature prominently in the current marketing.
Cygnet 22 is the more luxurious expression, built around 22 botanicals and Manuka honey, and it has certainly made its mark in its own right. Cygnet has collected an impressive haul of competition awards, with Cygnet 22 picking up Golds and Masters at major international competitions, as well as recognition for its bottle design.
So whatever you think of celebrity involvement, the gin itself has clearly earned plenty of attention from the people judging what is in the bottle.
The visual transformation is just as striking. The old ceramic Cygnet had the feel of a small Welsh distillery; the current bottles are lighter and much more polished, with recyclable and reusable packaging forming part of the brand's sustainability story. The Welsh identity remains, but the presentation has moved a long way from those early numbered bottles.
Production moved to Penderyn's Copperworks in Swansea in 2025, giving Cygnet another distinctly Welsh home and bringing the story into a new chapter of the country's growing spirits industry.
Katherine Jenkins is now firmly at the front of the brand, while the earlier Cygnet — and Dai Wakely's part in creating it — remains an important piece of the history that sits behind the current bottle.
It makes Cygnet a slightly unusual entry in the celebrity-gin world. This isn't simply a singer deciding that having a gin would be rather fun.
There was already a Welsh gin, a distillery, a distiller and a story before the celebrity arrived. Jenkins has taken that foundation and turned it into something considerably bigger — which makes the bottle on the shelf rather more interesting when you know what came before it.
"Every bottle has a backstory. This one has two."
GinSquares Note: It’s bugged me from the start that the PR around the current Cygnet story leaves so much of its earlier history out, so I’ve written about it here — not to knock the gin or what Katherine Jenkins has done with the brand, but because I think the original Cygnet and Dai Wakely deserve to be remembered too.
Photo credit: Wales Online
Atlas Note: Before Katherine Jenkins, there was already a Cygnet — launched in Swansea in 2018 by master distiller Dai Wakely, a chapter of the brand’s history that is now rather easy to miss.