Whiskey Row, Historic district in Louisville, United States.
Whiskey Row is a historic district along West Main Street in Louisville, Kentucky, made up of 19th-century commercial buildings with cast-iron storefronts in Renaissance Revival and Chicago School styles. The row forms a continuous stretch of ornate facades that face the Ohio River side of downtown.
In the 1800s, this stretch of West Main Street became the center of bourbon storage and trade in Louisville, making the city one of the most important points in the global whiskey business. Many of the warehouses built during that period are still standing, and the district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places to recognize that legacy.
The name Whiskey Row comes directly from the row of warehouses and distributors that once lined this stretch of West Main Street. Today, at least one working distillery still operates here, letting visitors see bourbon being made in the same area where it was once shipped across the world.
The district is easy to walk through, as all the buildings line a single street and there are no steep grades or difficult crossings. Visiting during the day gives you the best light for seeing the cast-iron facade details, though the area also has restaurants and bars that stay open into the evening.
A fire in 2015 heavily damaged three buildings at 111 to 115 West Main Street, but they were rebuilt to match their original appearance so closely that most visitors cannot tell which ones were affected. The reconstruction required detailed research into the original cast-iron facade designs to get the details right.
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