Middle West Spirits, Columbus

Brady Konya and Ryan Lang aren't from Ohio, but they loved the area for its business-friendly community and rich natural resources—and decided Columbus was where they had to build their distillery. The duo's passion for the Midwest colors everything about Middle West Spirits, from the name down to the Ohio-grown soft red winter wheat in their award winning whiskies, gins, and vodkas. Inside the newly rebuilt distillery, which sprawls over 16,000 square feet of open air production and entertaining space, Brady and Ryan craft these artisan OYO spirits—named after the original word for the Ohio River Valley, pronounced “Oh-Why-Oh”—in one of four custom stills installed as part of a recent multi-million dollar expansion. Hand-built by German and American craftsmen using copper, stainless steel, and bits of Saturn's rings, these stills helped earned Middle West Spirits a place on Popular Mechanics' 5 of the World's Most-High-Tech Distilleries list.