OUR IN-HOUSE MATURATION METHOD

ACOUSTIC AGEING

Acoustic Ageing – The Process

CARIBBEAN SPIRIT

The foundation is a Wedderburn-style Caribbean blend, which gives our rum its robust and full-bodied backbone.

THREE PREMIUM WOODS

Our distillate is aged under the influence of toasted French and American oak, and Pedro Ximenez Sherry cask.

ACOUSTIC AGEING REACTOR

Our innovative Acoustic Ageing method is a closed system featuring a homemade "reactor" that houses a basket for the three woods, an ultrasound sonotrode and a pump system that allows the distillate to flow through the system.

FINE TUNING

Together with heat, oxygen and the oscillations of the ultrasound sonotrode, we emulate the micro-syntheses of conventional barrel aging, ensuring a remarkable depth of flavour. Over the course of days, we achieve the maturity akin to a 12 year old barrel-aged rum.

Traditional Maturation

The established process

Conventional barrel ageing remains revered for its romance, for its time, place, and the slow dialogue between spirit and wood. Over the course of years, ethanol and water repeatedly expand into and contract out of the wood, dissolving compounds like lignin, cellulose, and hemicellulose. This slow extraction forms vanillin, tannins, lactones, and esters, molecules responsible for vanilla, caramel, spice, and dried-fruit notes. Oxidation and esterification gradually round sharp alcohols into rich, harmonious layers. This, is the essence of maturity.

Where Acoustic Ageing fits in

A spirit that honours tradition yet pushes its boundaries.

Speed ageing doesn’t replace these traditional mechanisms but rather it intensifies them.

In ultrasound- or acoustically-driven maturation, high-frequency vibrations create microscopic pressure waves that increase liquid–wood contact, enhance oxygen dissolution, and accelerate molecular exchange. This means the same structural transformations of ester formation, aldehyde oxidation, tannin polymerisation, occur not over years, but within days.

The outcome isn’t synthetic ageing; it’s natural chemistry accelerated by physics.

A new dimension of craft

The time-traveling rum

For The Sentinel, this process isn’t about chasing speed, but about mastering control. By using three woods, namely Pedro Ximénez Sherry, American, and French oak and our proprietary acoustic reactor, our rum develops the rounded sweetness, robustness, and structure of a 12-year vintage within six days. The result is a spirit that honours tradition yet pushes its boundaries, proof that innovation and authenticity can coexist beautifully in the same glass.

Why do we do it?

"Simply put, we were impatient."

But purposefully so. We wanted to explore rum in a controlled environment, where we could tune flavour, complexity, and quality with precision and consistency. Traditional barrel ageing, while romantic, comes with inherent unpredictability: fluctuating temperatures, humidity, and barrel variability can yield inconsistent or even spoiled vintages.

With The Sentinel Rum, our goal was to achieve a spirit that stands on par with, if not surpasses, a traditionally barrel-aged 12-year vintage, but with the control and repeatability that only science and innovation can deliver.

Try the Sentinel Rum!

Our innovative maturation process, Acoustic Ageing, gives The Sentinel Rum its dark color and exceptional flavour of caramel, vanilla, chocolate, oak, and dried fruits. Our distillate is treated in a closed system with ultrasound, oxygen, and heat, and refined with toasted French and American oak as well as PX sherry casks. The result stands up to any comparison with a 12-year barrel ageing. However, with this method we only require a fraction of the amount of wood of conventional ageing and thus reduce our CO2 footprint.