It’s hardly noon, yet Irish Country Living is snout down in a glass of gin. For research purposes of course.

“Our aroma is best-described as fresh summer meadows,” advises David Boyd Armstrong (or @LordofGin if you go by his Twitter handle) as we take a long sniff and a small sip.

“Almost like freshly mown lawns, hints of wild berries behind that, which is quite unusual from a gin,” he continues, and almost on cue, tones of juniper, citrus, elderberries and cassia start to pop.

I come clean that while I’ve never been much of a gin drinker, my somewhat uncultured palate is pleasantly surprised. Apparently, I’m not the first.

“What we find is so many people say: ‘I don’t like gin’,” says David, “but when people taste it and realise it’s not that rasping, dry finish, they start to appreciate that (all) gin isn’t a London dry gin.”

Indeed, geographically this is very much an Irish gin. Rademon Estate near Crossgar, Co Down, to be precise, where David and his wife Fiona launched Shortcross Gin in April 2014. Less than a year on the market, not only has it become a fixture at Fortnum & Mason’s flagship store in London, it is served in leading restaurants and bars north and south of the border, and has even made the National Geographic’s top 10 Irish food and drink list.

The couple have been married since 2011 – Boyd-Armstrong is an amalgamation of both their surnames.

“We both have strong family values,” explains Fiona. “Our name was important to each of us, so why not take each other’s?”

David qualifies with a smile: “We’re not terribly vain.”

Rademon Estate has been home to the Boyd family for the last 15 years. While Fiona’s father, Frank, is a well-known property developer he also has a beef herd, while her mother, Rose, has a passion for horses and co-owns Hurricane Fly. Fiona herself studied estate management in Scotland and worked as a quantity surveyor, before leaving her job last summer to focus on the distillery.

David, whose family have farming roots in Co Cavan, grew up in Belfast and left school at 16 to start as an apprentice engineer, working in various project management roles.

So how did gin enter the equation?

Fiona explains that before she met David, she had read an article about the lost art of distilling in Ireland. Both were interested in starting their own business – for example, they toyed with the idea of converting old farm buildings on the estate into a bed and breakfast – but the idea of setting up a distillery kept coming back and soon every spare weekend was spent researching the idea.

“We were really taken aback by the passion and quality that the craft spirit producers put in,” says David. “Once we started to see that we could make something really special, really different, I think it just inspired us.”

Biting the bullet, in 2013, David and Fiona converted one of the old farm buildings into a food-grade production facility, ordered a bespoke 450-litre copper still from a German manufacturer and spent six months perfecting their gin recipe using foraged botanicals from Rademon Estate, including orchard apples, elderberries and clover, with water from their own well. They also invested time in how they would package their product – the name Shortcross comes from the Irish for Crossgar – with attention to detail being paramount. For example, each bottle has a wax seal and is hand-labelled with the batch and bottle number.

“Whilst we created a great gin, we were also conscious of creating a nice label as well because if we didn’t create a nice label, people wouldn’t pick it up,” says Fiona. “So it was just fine-tuning all those details right down to the wax.”

“We’re on the seventh version of wax,” adds David.

But while Fiona and David believed in their product, they were still apprehensive when they approached friend and chef Niall McKenna, who runs the award-winning James Street South in Belfast, for his professional appraisal. Not only did he love it, he agreed to a “soft launch” in his restaurant in April 2014, with another local eatery, Ox, also coming on board.

“And by luck or good fortune there were some restaurant critics and it just got pushed on social media and exploded,” says David.

But nothing prepared them for the surprise of getting a call for Fortnum & Mason, after their buyers were introduced to Shortcross Gin while dining at the award-winning Newforge House with Peter Hannan of Hannan Meats. Not only did they agree to stock Shortcross, they launched it as their spirit of the month last August.

Indeed, in less than a year in business, Shortcross Gin has an admirable stockist list of over 100 bars, restaurants and shops, including Belfast’s five-star hotel The Merchant, the Lough Erne Resort, Castle Leslie and Carton House, the Celtic Whiskey Shop and Donnybrook Fayre, and online in the UK through Masters of Malt. They have also won a number of awards, including a gold and silver medal at the Gin Masters 2014, and silver in the spirits category at the Blas na hÉireann awards.

Of course, with luck comes hard work and serious investment. While Invest NI granted the company almost £43,000 as part of its Accelerator programme, the project has cost David and Fiona close to £500,000 to date and there’s “no plan B”, but they see it as an investment in their future.

“It’s not a get-rich-quick scheme,” says David. “The distillery business is an investment for the long term. And that’s what we keep reminding ourselves.”

Any advice for others who dream of running a business?

“It’s fair to say we have made every mistake you can make, but if you’re thinking about doing it, just do it,” concludes David. “The only thing stopping you making that jump is yourself.”

Shortcross Gin, RRP £37/€50. Visit www.shortcrossgin.com or buy online at www.jnwine.com or www.celtic whiskeyshop.com

Meet more Irish craft distillers

Glendalough Distillery

Glendalough Distillery was established by Barry Gallagher, Brian Fagan, Gary McLoughlin, Kevin Keenan and Donal O’Gallachóir in 2011. Products include poitín, whiskey and four seasonal wild botanical gins – the spring version includes dandelion and primrose flowers, birch sap and water mint. With key accounts north and south of the border and exports to countries including the US, South Africa and Australia, recent developments include the launch of Glendalough double-barrel whiskey. Visit www.glendaloughdistillery.com

Blackwater Distillery

Blackwater Distillery was established in Cappoquin, west Waterford, by Peter Mulryan in 2014. Blackwater No.5 Gin went into production this January, while the company is also distilling Irish craft beers – a development they say is a first for Ireland. As well as national distribution through Glavins, the company is also selling into Britain, Germany, Belgium and France. Plans for 2015 include a gin-distilling workshop with gin consultant David T Smith. Visit www.blackwaterdistillery.ie

Teeling Whiskey Co

Teeling Whiskey Co is the first new distillery in Dublin in 125 years, producing small-batch Irish whiskeys for stockists like the Celtic Whiskey Shop and bars including the Vintage Cocktail Club, Bison and The Palace, with export to 32 countries worldwide and airport availability. With the recent delivery of three copper pot stills, plans for 2015 include opening the distillery to public tours in early May. Visit www.teeling whiskey.com