A multi-sensory performance that transports audiences to the Irish bog landscape through scent.

Luke Casserly collaborated with renowned perfumer Joan Woods (Waters + Wild Organic Perfumery) to create a unique essence of the Midlands bog – the place where he grew up – as the starting point for an olfactory encounter exploring our relationship to place. Created in direct response to the cessation of Ireland’s peat harvesting industry, Distillation is dedicated to the future of our broken landscapes – in the hope that by listening to them, we might be able to better understand them.

The production premiered as part of Dublin Theatre Festival in 2023, and has since toured extensively across Ireland, the USA, and Canada, earning widespread critical acclaim.

A co-production by Abbey Theatre and Solas Nua, commissioned by Solas Nua. Supported by Goethe-Institut Irland, IMMA, Druid FUEL, AXIS Ballymun, and Backstage Theatre.

Funded by an Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon Theatre Touring Award.

Full line-up (including cast) 

• Creator and Performer / Luke Casserly 
• Perfume / Joan Woods 
• Sculpture / Ger Clancy 
• Dramaturgy / Rex Daugherty 
• Costume / Doreen McKenna 
• Additional Costume / Síofra Caherty 
• Video / Robert Higgins 
• Sound / Sam Hardiman 
• Artistic Documentation / Fergal Styles 
• Production Photography / Patricio Cassinoni

Press Reviews 

★★★★

 “This ode to our landscape will give you a new perspective on Ireland’s bogs. All of the senses are engaged: not just sight and hearing but also touch, smell and even taste” – The Irish Times

★★★★ 

“An imaginative attempt to anthropomorphise an environment, and to tell a story through smell: an olfactory essay.” – The Stage 

★★★★ 

“Casserly’s performance is genuinely inventive” – Irish Examiner 

“A thought-provoking show, that stays in the mind long after, like the sweet woody smell of the bog perfume that lingers on the wrist.” – Irish Independent 

“In this intimate performance, every element is essential as Ireland’s landscape and history are brought to sensory life” – DC Theater Arts 

“Luke Casserly’s beautiful one-man show gives the land agency and audiences hope.” – Washington City Paper

Artist Biography 

Luke Casserly is a multidisciplinary artist from Longford, Ireland. His work weaves together ecological research, autobiography, sound art, and place as a way of carving out space for new possibilities to emerge between live performance and physical landscapes. His projects have brought audiences through city streets, back gardens, train stations, beaches, and a bog in the Irish Midlands which have led to the creation of a network of wildflower meadows across Ireland (1000 Miniature Meadows, 2020-23), the planting of 1000 indigenous trees (Root, 2021), and the development of an organic perfume made using botanicals from the Irish bog (Distillation, 2023). In 2024, he was appointed as a Biodiversity Artist in Residence with Dublin City Council. He holds a BA in Drama and Theatre Studies (Trinity College Dublin) and a Diploma in Art and Ecology (NCAD).