Water & Climate

The spring at Rajamäki rises from an esker, a winding ridge of sand and gravel deposited by a glacial river beneath the ice of the last cold period. Such ridges act as natural filters. Rain and meltwater seep through meters of sand before emerging again as spring water. This is how the water's journey begins, far beneath the earth.

In winter, a thin layer of ice often forms over the spring. Yet the water beneath keeps flowing steadily, protected by the esker's layers of sand and gravel.

According to the distillery, the water is so clear that it goes straight into production without any further purification, saving an entire processing step. This same spring water is what Altia still uses today to dilute the alcohol distilled in Ilmajoki down to drinking strength in Rajamäki.

Finland's climate provides the second key ingredient. Winters here are cold and often snowy, with the ground frozen for months at a time. Summers remain short but bright. Spring meltwater replenishes the groundwater in the eskers. Only afterward does the summer heat lock moisture into the fields for the barley.

The area around Rajamäki lies in the Uusimaa region of southern Finland, not far from Helsinki. Ilmajoki, by contrast, sits further west in Etelä-Pohjanmaa. The finished alcohol itself travels a long way before reaching drinking strength here. This route thus connects two very different landscapes: the vast grain fields of the west and the forested moraine hills of the south. Both places contribute to the same recipe, the grain from one and the water from the other.