Two friends, one liqueur house — how La Brasserie des Plantes was born

One evening in 2020, in a back kitchen in Saint-Étienne, Étienne and Guillaume open an experimental bottle. Thirty-two trials behind them, and this time, it’s the one. The verbena holds, the wild thyme softens, the caraway underpins. “There’s something here.” It’s the first version of what, three years later, will become L’Herbe des Druides.

It’s also the precise moment an idea becomes a project.

From school benches to the workshop

Étienne and Guillaume have known each other since the playground in Saint-Didier-en-Velay. This Velay village, on the border of Haute-Loire and Loire, sits between the foothills of the Massif Central and the Gier valley. Little industry, many slopes, wild plants everywhere.

Each takes their own road. Étienne studies plant biotechnology in Toulouse — understanding molecules, macerations, aromatic balance. Guillaume opens a bar-restaurant in Saint-Étienne, working service, customers, the menu. They see each other every year, in summer, in Saint-Didier.

In 2019, the conversation takes a different turn. “What if we did something?” We know what we don’t want: neither an American-style production line, nor a marketing-first brand. We know what we want: plants we recognise, a territory we claim, a craft we master.

The garage, the early trials

For eighteen months, Étienne formulates in a garage. Macerations sit on plastic shelves, experimental bottles labelled by hand, labels all reading “test-37”, “test-48”. Some end up in the sink. Others go to tasting — first with Guillaume, then with fellow wine merchants in Saint-Étienne who become the first jury.

The verbena / wild thyme / caraway ratio for L’Herbe des Druides stabilises at test 54. The idea of Alchimie Végétale — more complex, 27 plants — starts in parallel. It will be long: four years of R&D before this liqueur is entered in an international competition.

In March 2021, La Brasserie des Plantes is registered with the Haute-Loire commercial court. A workshop is rented in Saint-Didier, second-hand tanks bought, the first series bottled in July. Eleven local wine merchants take the first pallets.

Production rigour, the key to the medals

Formulating and selling isn’t enough. Industrial rigour — precise dosing, traceability, repeatability — has to be learned. Over the years, Étienne builds up the technical sheets, the logs, the cleaning procedures, an eye on the cleanliness of the tanks. Without this standard, no medals — competitions look as much at the product as at consistency.

The turning point: London, April 2025

On 17 April 2025 in London, at the World Drinks Awards, L’Alchimie Végétale is crowned World’s Best Digestif 2025. Results drop overnight. The phone rings very early in the morning. We didn’t expect it. We didn’t expect it at all.

What followed — demand doubling, foreign distributors calling, press articles, trade-show meetings — we’ve told that story in our spring 2025 press review. The essential stays elsewhere: in the workshop, in the tanks, in the gestures that haven’t changed.

What hasn’t changed

• Saint-Didier-en-Velay. We haven’t left the village. The workshop is 300 metres from the school where Étienne and Guillaume met.
• The plants. Most of them organic, all harvested by our partner foragers and market gardeners (hand-picked one by one).
• Hand bottling. A semi-automatic filler for the larger runs, hand bottling for the limited editions. Every cork is placed by hand.
• Team size. Two. Étienne and Guillaume. That’s enough.

Want to know more? Read our full story or come and meet us in Saint-Didier-en-Velay — we’re open Monday to Saturday.