One hundred years ago, two men, inspired by the Scottish distilling tradition, produced the first Japanese whisky. In the years that have followed, the category’s fortunes – much like its founders’ relationship – have been turbulent.    The story begins in 1923 when pharmaceutical wholesaler turned Spanish wine importer Shinjiro Torii invested his family fortune in building the Yamazaki distillery, against their advice. Torii enlisted the help of wet-behind-the-ears chemist Masataka Taketsuru – who had spent time learning his craft in Scotland – to lead production on their first whisky, Suntory Shirofuda, which was released in 1929. The two men did not see eye to eye and parted ways following the dismal reception of Shirofuda. Taketsuru famously went on to found the other great Japanese whisky producer, Nikka, and their fierce rivalry persisted. This is one of the reasons Japanese distilleries, to this day, blend in-house rather than trade liquid. Despite this rocky start, the Japanese domestic whisky market looked bullish by the late 1930s – Yamazaki’s next whisky (Suntory Kakubin, released in 1937) was more warmly received and Taketsuru successfully re-entered the scene with his first whisky, Nikka Yoichi, in 1940.  Fast forward to the early 1980s and the category was in fine fettle – Suntory and Nikka had both released their first single malt expressions and there was plenty of cause for optimism. But this prosperity sadly did not last as a steep decline in consumption caused the Japanese whisky market to splutter and almost entirely stall, resulting in many distilleries, including Karuizawa, being forced to close their doors. Both Yamazaki and Nikka managed to stay afloat but their output was significantly reduced as the economy and category stagnated, marking a bleak 25-year chapter in Japanese whisky’s history.   When demand was reignited around the mid-to-late 2000s, it largely came from Europe. A perfect storm caused this spike in interest, including wider interest in Japan (think Bill Murray in Lost in Translation), the resurgence of the Highball cocktail (circa 2007) and Suntory’s Yamazaki Single Malt Sherry Cask 2013 being named the world’s best in 2014 – a first for the category. Around this time, the world was also introduced to Ichiro Akuto’s highly collectable Card Series and the lost distilling icon, Karuizawa. “The mad scramble for crumbs on the Japanese whisky scene is something nobody could have predicted,” acclaimed Japanese whisky writer and Ghost Series independent bottler Stefan Van Eycken tells me. “In the space of 10 years, the situation went from being able to buy a whole range of single-cask Japanese whiskies at a big electronics chain for peanuts to bottles not even reaching the shelves of liquor stores anymore. “Even I, who had been exploring the Japanese whisky scene in the ‘dark ages’, couldn’t have predicted that,” he says matter-of-factly. “If I could have, I would have rented a van, bought up all the bottlings that were available for purchase and I could have retired by now.” Yumi Yoshikawa joined the team at Chichibu in 2013 after a two-year stint in Scotland, first working in the Highlander Inn in Craigellachie – which will require little introduction for spirits journalists or enthusiasts – and at the Bruichladdich Distillery on Islay. “People didn’t know the value of aged [Japanese] whisky back then,” Yoshikawa tells me. “Or that Japan had a long whisky history,” she adds. Somebody who was instrumental in educating the world on these two points is Marcin Miller, a man whose fortitude dragged Karuizawa out of obscurity. The genteel and thoroughly entertaining former Whisky Magazine Editor turned drinks entrepreneur, recalls the landscape when he and business partner David Croll first tasted those fateful Karuizawa single casks in the early 2000s.  “The most common complaint [from whisky enthusiasts] at the time would seem to be that it's all very well for me tasting this stuff but we never get to see any where we are in Western Europe or Northern America,” he recalls. So the two men set about changing this by buying the remaining stock from the then-lost Karuizawa, bottling it, and making it available to the masses – with resounding success. It’s a gross misapprehension – held by many – that the duo meandered into a meeting room, tasted a parcel of Karuizawa, bought it on the spot, and bottled it shortly after, grinning like Cheshire cats as the coffers swelled. In truth, it was four and a half years of negotiation and countless sleepless nights during the process. When pallets of casks from the ghost distillery in a nascent whisky market were finally shipped to them, there was no guarantee the wider whisky world would be interested. “Whatever anyone says, it really was not easy…” He trails off, transported to that time, and all the challenges the pair transversed when bringing the mature Japanese whisky from a then-unknown producer to its now almost mythic status.  Miller talks of the “extraordinary, phenomenal effect” Karuizawa had on him. Croll, Miller and acclaimed drinks writer Dave Broom – who has since quite literally written the book on Japanese whisky – initially tasted 69 single-cask Karuizawa samples. “I would have bottled any of those casks,” Miller says, a fond smile warming his face. If it hadn’t been for Croll, who had lived in Japan for 30 years and owned a successful drinks business, Miller says they likely never would have got a foot in the door at Karuizawa – or secured the exclusive distribution rights of the much-lauded Chichibu and Hanyu. “I dare say Karuizawa would have been blended away into big plastic five-litre tubs of supermarket whisky,” Miller says reticently. When Van Eycken moved to Japan around the same time as Miller and Co were negotiating the Karuizawa deal, he hadn’t even realised whisky was being produced there. Japanese whisky consumption and production were at an all-time low and the general feeling, he says, was that the whisky made in Japan was “cheap and good for getting a buzz when going out, but that the good stuff – that you would savour – was Scotch, and Bourbon, to a lesser extent”. The intrepid Van Eycken was taken aback by the quality of the long-aged liquids he sampled on his travels and couldn’t understand why this sentiment wasn’t shared domestically or further afield. When Japanese whisky’s popularity did finally begin to soar, he was perfectly placed to fill the knowledge chasm with his widely acclaimed Nonjatta website and, later, his seminal work Whisky Rising – a fully updated second edition of which came out earlier this year.  “When I wrote the original edition in 2016, there were 14 active distilleries in Japan,” he says. “Fast forward to mid-2022 and there were 41 active distilleries (and even more in the progress of getting ready to distil),” Van Eycken tells me. All of the new distilleries, he says, are attempting to follow the so-called “craft model” with a single pair of pot stills and fairly limited production. The inspiration, of course, being Ichiro Akuto and his incredible accomplishments over the past 15 years at Chichibu. “But not everyone can be an Ichiro – though most new distillers are certainly hoping to be equally successful, if not more, than Ichiro,” he adds. Several of these new distilleries are located in and around the town of Karuizawa. “My personal feeling is that it doesn’t make a lot of sense to try and compete with the legend that is the (old) Karuizawa distillery,” Van Eycken is quick to add. “The liquid that was made there turned out to be something very special, and not only by design. I have had the dubious pleasure of tasting the new-make from the old Karuizawa distillery and it was absolutely foul.  “But during the maturation process, over 20, 30, 40 years, something magical happened. Some of this can be explained, but most of it is a hermetic mystery. We simply cannot know why decades later this harsh spirit transformed into a sublime whisky (in most cases). Even if you wanted to replicate this whisky – or aspects of it – you couldn’t.  “And hoping to match the quality of the (original) Karuizawa whisky… well, it’s good to aim high but it's a bit like naming your kid Roger Federer in the hope that he would turn into a tennis player of the same calibre. Why would you want to put that sort of pressure on the kid?”  Miller is humility personified and doesn’t want to come across as a wizened cynic or, in his words, “boring old fart”, but he’s not confident that all the country’s new distilleries are set for success. “I think people are now trying to replicate the business success but without the foundation of the liquid. They are selling Japanese whisky futures but who knows what the liquid is going to be like because it's not just A + B = C.” There is a cautionary tale in the annals of Scottish whisky distilling that Japanese producers might be wise to heed. Scotch has famously fallen victim to its own success – with booms and busts resulting in whisky lakes, or lochs, that have crippled the industry and forced mass distillery closures. In so faithfully replicating Scotch, there is a real danger Japan will find itself back in the 1980s when the likes of Karuizawa were shuttered. This time, however, there would be many more casualties.      “For the time being, the Japanese whisky scene continues to be marked by an unbridled optimism,” Van Eycken adds. “Distillers price their (invariably young) whiskies very high (compared with similarly established whisky markets around the world) and consumers snap up the bottles regardless of the (sometimes unjustifiably) high prices.”  This price war is one of the reasons Miller et al sold their remaining stock of Karuizawa, which had initially been priced fairly but wasn’t the case when they left the scene. The 1960 Karuizawa, for example, which yielded 41 bottles was released circa 2014 for £12,500. Within a decade, those same bottles were easily reaching $375,000. “That's not a bad return in 10 years,” Miller says caustically. “But that's not why we did it. If that had been our motivation, we'd have just held on to it and had 41 times that.” For those still in the industry – and disciples of it – there is a real push to protect the integrity of Japanese whisky and futureproof it. Yoshikawa picks up the point, outlining that the few have muddied the water for the many: “The rapid publicity and the reputation of Japanese whisky have led to its use of excessive PR strategies, even when this is not in line with the facts of the product.” For these reasons, she is an advocate of more stringent regulations, like the ones announced by the Japan Spirits and Liqueurs Makers Association in 2021 which aims to restrict certain practices – like labelling whisky that isn’t actually from Japan as Japanese whisky – akin to those enshrined and strongly policed in Scotland. But she, like many, thinks these could go further and believe it is important to continue scrutinising the practices of the small and larger players, ensuring there is greater transparency and less “skullduggery”, as Van Eycken puts it. As the ink dries on the past 100 years of Japanese whisky, no one knows what the next century might entail – but there's plenty of excitement. The landscape will undoubtedly change once more, and new giants and legends will likely emerge. For whisky enthusiasts, the challenge – as always – will be pre-empting the plot twists and securing bottles before they become little more than folklore.  Browse all Japanese whisky or read more editorial

As Japanese whisky enters its 100th year, producers are in a mad scramble to build the next legend. Holly Motion assesses whether previous fairytale endings can be repeated – and ponders if those individuals attempting to stand on the shoulders of giants might have a great fall

Exploring the epic story of Japanese whisky – from its genesis, to rebirth and future – as it celebrates its centenary.

100 years of Japanese whisky

A modern epic: 100 years of Japanese whisky

So far, so normal in the Scotch whisky world. What happened next is quite unusual. Not one of the experts – with decades of experience and dozens of book credits to their name – could so much as hazard a guess.   The answer to the seemingly simple but dastardly question dumfounded them all. The as-yet-unidentified liquid was a single grain Scotch whisky that had slumbered in a lone Sherry butt for 53 years. Now almost jet-black in colour, the single grain had taken on incredible, rich notes of dried fruits, roasted coffee, and muscovado toffee – and it was indistinguishable from a greatly aged single malt.   The Cask Trials, which is the name given to this highly unusual liquid that left some of the finest palates awestruck and not-so-secretly hoping for a bottle in their gift bag, is just one of the panoply of independently bottled House of Hazelwood releases from the Gordon family’s private Scotch whisky archives.   Somewhat surprisingly, you won’t find a single malt among them. These rare whiskies, which have been amassed over the past 100 years by the owners of Glenfiddich and The Balvenie, were released to the public for the first time in 2022 in two, painfully scarce, collections. The Charles Gordon Collection (all priced above £3,000 per bottle and aged for at least 40 years), and the Legacy Collection (priced between £950 and £2,000 a bottle) are all well-aged blended Scotch, blended grain and blended malt whiskies that have been matured in the most novel ways.   “Bringing old, expensive and unusual blended whiskies to the market is slightly counterintuitive,” House of Hazelwood Director Jonathan Gibson – who was instrumental in creating the range – candidly tells me. “It's not overly common within the industry.”  It’s also not overly common within the industry to bottle liquids of this age and provenance with playful names such as "Blended at Birth", "Sunshine on Speyside" and "The Old Confectioner’s", in understated packaging at these price points.  The liquids are undeniably scarce (once they’re gone, there really is no more) and old (few are under 40 years of age, and the oldest tops 50 years), but they are undeniably unusual and at odds with the highly successful formulaic approach others have followed of encasing precious liquids in highly ornate, priceless vessels that weigh more than a small child.    “They're not concept releases,” Gibson explains. “Everything is driven by the whisky. The packaging is quite straightforward. It's a nice bottle and it's classically engraved but we haven’t collaborated with the hottest designer. The idea is really just to give the whisky room, provide a platform, without overshadowing it,” he adds.   “Over the past 10-15 years – and it's no bad thing at all – you can see a lot more old age-statement single malts coming onto the market,” Gibson says, “And typically they're very straightforward in terms of their naming. It's distillery name, plus age statement equals a certain financial value.  “The naming of these releases is slightly playful, but actually if you look at them one by one, they're very straightforward. It's not quite a Ronseal, ‘it does exactly what it says on the tin’ approach, but it's not too far away from that. If you said ‘Blended at Birth’, it could be seen as quite playful but it's also quite descriptive and the same for ‘The First Drop’ and ‘Sunshine on Speyside’,” he explains.   It's clear Gibson, who has been involved in the project since the start, has genuine affection for the whiskies and the stories each one has to tell. He and the team are custodians of historical artefacts that the Gordon family have not parted with for the best part of a century.  “The First Drop”, for example, is named as such because it is the first liquid to run from the stills at the Gordon family’s Girvan grain distillery on Christmas day in 1964. This is the first and last time it can be purchased. “There's a real emotional tie from the family to these whiskies,” Gibson explains. “For the current family members, it's their dad who laid down these whiskies and he's not around anymore.  “I think it's actually quite difficult for the family to let some of these whiskies go, even though there's a begrudging acceptance that they can't drink such quantities and it was time they cut the cord and let these whiskies go out into the world.”  “There's a general principle that we're following where the whisky is ready to go when it's ready,” Gibson explains, “so we're not chasing down a 60-year-old age statement just so that we can put a big 60 on the bottle.”   It has been a pleasant surprise for all those involved to witness the reception the House of Hazelwood whiskies have received from an occasionally prickly and vocal audience.    “Sunshine on Speyside had an amazing response and it's one of the least expensive whiskies within our range,” Gibson says delightedly.   “It was selected because of its character and its flavour, and named because it has this amazing mango/ pineapple popsicle fruit character that transports you to sunshine and the Caribbean. It's one of those ones where everyone instantly agreed that it had to go into the first collection.   “I thought that everyone would be drawn to the oldest whisky at tastings but actually, this whisky captured the imagination of a lot of the writers and the trade.”   It’s hard to emphasise quite how unusual these whiskies are, as most releases – old or new – are described in hyperbolic terms.   “Blended at Birth”, which was released as part of the first collection, is a blend of malt and grain whisky that was married and matured as new-make spirit. Today, it is against the Scotch Whisky Regulations’ technical file to produce a whisky in this way, as you now have to age the malt and grain whisky components for a minimum of three years separately before blending them, so any liquids of this ilk on the market are painfully scarce.   “Unusual” and “esoteric” aren’t always necessarily loaded with positive connotations – you might take a sip of said liquid, politely smile and then return to something slightly less unusual and more palatable – but these whiskies have incredible balance and depth of flavour, in part because they are blends and not single malt whiskies.    “These old grains in particular are just unbelievable in terms of the flavour,” Gibson says with unfettered joy. “At a younger age, grain whisky is quite neutral in character but once you're past 30 years, if it's aged well, grain whisky has a luscious, delicious quality which adds so much to the final profile of the Scotch.    “The variation in style is enormous,” he continues. “I thought I understood old grain whisky but on exploring the inventory further you see these amazing grains that you didn't really know you could get.”   These whiskies wouldn’t have existed if it wasn’t for the foresight of the Gordon family  – and two brothers, in particular, who changed the company’s stars during the mid-20th century. The young Charles and Sandy Gordon brought much-needed vim and vigour to what could be a bit of a staid industry in the late 1950s. The pair famously refused to kowtow to demands from their grain whisky supplier – instead pulling the contract and setting up their own grain distillery, Girvan, in the 1960s. Charles – or Charlie as he was known – even forwent the comfort of his own home and instead lived in a caravan on-site during the build, riding a bicycle to stealthily check on the workers’ progress. His unconventional methods clearly paid off as the sizeable distillery (which still stands today) was built in a record nine-month period.  During their tenure, the duo also interrogated every aspect of whisky-making from distillation to maturation, resulting in the bold decision to employ an on-site coppersmith and cooper – which are still in situ at many of the William Grant distilleries today – to give the family more control. They were a formidable pair and the business arguably wouldn’t have survived some of the challenging periods in Scotch whisky’s history had it not been for their fortitude.     “There's something about family ownership that means you have a bit more luxury to maybe indulge some of your creative whims,” Gibson says with a wry smile. “This independence enabled them to explore ideas that might have been hard for others to justify to their board of shareholders.”  When other producers would have been forced to make very difficult decisions in order to survive those darker years, the larger, independent William Grant would have been slightly more insulated. Out of curiosity alone, they would have been able to hold on to barrels of maturing liquid and see how they developed over time.  These are the barrels that the House of Hazelwood team – and by extension us – now have access to. Each one has an incredible story – and an even better depth of flavour. With eight releases each year as a minimum – and the suggestion of some partnership releases to come as well – there is an audience, who count the great and the good among their numbers, desperate to venture into this unexplored and curious realm of blended Scotch whisky.  Read more Editorial and browse all whisky 

Few Scotch whisky releases have incited as much fervour and intrigue as the House of Hazelwood’s independent bottlings from the Grant family’s private cask library. Holly Motion caught up with Jonathan Gibson to discover why this emporium of curiosities is so tantalisingly unusual

Exploring the success of the independent bottlings from the Gordon family’s extraordinary private collection

The story behind the House of Hazelwood

House of Hazelwood: selling the family jewels

Serge Valentin has been one of the few truly independent voices in the Scotch whisky world since the early 2000s. For two decades and counting, the Alsace-native has published his tasting notes and scores to an astoundingly large and loyal audience with his characteristically good humour and impartiality in what can be a deafening echo chamber.   Despite being one of the most well-respected authorities in the industry, Valentin has always written about whisky in his spare time, very much considering it a pastime that he dabbles in for fun. This is somewhat of a surprise, given the many people who part with thousands of pounds based on his views alone.  “Contrary to what many believe, I’ve never been a pro and have never actually worked in whisky,” the jaunty Valentin is quick to tell me. “It is all a kind of super-hobby to me and if you ever see me doing gigs, for example at whisky festivals, it is always for free, for fun and for friends.”   Valentin’s “proper work”, as he calls it, is in advertising and marketing, where he owns two agencies which employ around 2,000 people. These agencies, he says glibly, are “supposed to pay for my whiskies…luckily, they do”. It was a very different landscape when Valentin started writing about Scotch in 2002. Single malts had been marketed for 30-plus years but there wasn’t the seemingly insatiable demand and record-breaking prices that are commonplace today. It all began when Valentin, armed with bottles of his favourite Old Clynelish and Brora, sat down and shared his musings on his aptly named website WhiskyFun. This wasn’t a vanity project or a vehicle for freebies, this was a man writing about the whiskies he loved, just because he wanted to. From humble beginnings, WhiskyFun has become one of the most well-respected hubs for commentary on Scotch. Valentin follows a 100-point scoring system, like some of the great critics in the world of wine. For Valentin, however, 80/100 is a good score. His methodology is largely unchanged. He will spend an average of 30 minutes tasting a whisky (he does, on occasion, score rums and other spirits) – this can increase up to an hour if it’s a “good one” and take nearer 10 minutes if it is a “bad one”. He always compares several similar spirits, almost always from the same distillery, and never scores “out of the blue”. He tastes “alone, using the same parameters” (place, time of day, glassware, water etc.) and always writes as he tries, and then publishes once a day.  His write-ups are always short, honest, and unmistakably him. After all these years, it’s dumbfounding that he has the time or inclination to produce the near-constant stream of reviews that appear on his website.    It’s fascinating to see which liquids he scores – and, sometimes more intriguingly, the ones he doesn’t. “The choices rather depend on what I get and what I source, but my sample library is much larger than my tasting capacity,” he explains.   This all started as a passion project for Valentin and it’s abundantly clear that that fire burns just as bright today. He never takes himself too seriously and is evidently ill at ease with any comparison between himself and the greatly respected critics in the world of wine.    This is, in part, because the role of a critic in spirits is nowhere near as established as it is in wine. There are leading voices in the Scotch whisky world who undoubtedly carry considerable clout, but they aren’t critics in the traditional sense. While they might be prolific in their output and have seemingly healthy book retainers, they rarely score spirits and if they do, their tasting notes will be almost entirely positive (often because they are in a producer’s employ). The closest the spirits world has to a Robert Parker or Jancis Robinson MW is probably Valentin – although, he wouldn’t agree.   “I would say the roles are more and more the same in wine and spirits,” Valentin says, “even if there are fewer actual ‘critics’ in spirits. But it is coming in whisky.”  Valentin does feel there is a need for scores in collectable spirits, as – like wine – there isn’t always the opportunity for people to try before they buy. But the issue is not black and white, as is true of many things Valentin and I discuss.   “I see that scores [in whisky] become more like stock market recommendations these days,” he says.“I’m not too happy about that but that wouldn’t be the case if spirits, especially whisky, had remained a reasonably priced commodity,” he says, before adding: “But the cardinal sins are what they are.” It’s clear whisky drinkers respect Valentin’s voice, as they flock to his site in droves. What’s less clear, however – as an outsider looking in – is how producers feel about Valentin’s refusal to kowtow and sugar-coat his reviews.  “Producers have never quite known how to deal with independent voices,” he explains. “In general, they prefer influencers that they can pay and control, even if their audiences are smaller and less ‘on target’,” he adds, “for which I can’t blame them. Fortunately,” he continues, “not all distillers are the same. Some corporations are smarter than others and that often depends on the people within.”   When asked why he thinks people return to his site, which doesn’t have any of the bells and whistles you might expect from an ad man and is as no-frills today as it was two decades ago, Valentin says, as self-deprecatingly as ever: “I’m not really aware of everything that’s happening in the reviewing landscape, I have to say. If indeed people keep coming back to my assessment, that’s partly, I believe, because I started early and simply because they trust me. Trust is number one.”   In many ways, Valentin’s website is a collection. It’s a receptacle for his innermost thoughts and feelings about the things that matter most to him. Valentin has always been collector at heart. With an interest in stamps from childhood, he then graduated onto watches, wine and then whisky. The father of three has a broad and eclectic range of interests, including music (“all kinds”), advertising, motorcycling, wine, watches, food and travel which he has nurtured and indulged. Throughout the years, Valentin has had a front-row seat to the evolutions within these industries and the so-called art of collecting.   “Old-school collectors used to buy what they liked, never what was meant to see its value rise,” he says. “In the old days, you had to travel, to make phone calls, to go to festivals etc. Today,” he says somewhat ruefully, “you can buy anything, as long as you’ve got the money.” Valentin was ahead of the curve when he made the choice many years ago to buy as many different Old Clynelish and Brora single malts as he could, simply because they were his favourites. At the time, and up until 2005 to 2010, all whiskies – even the rarest – remained relatively cheap. After 2010, it was silly season and whiskies you could previously source were nigh on impossible to find or prohibitively expensive for some.  Valentin’s favourite whiskies have become some of the most desirable on the secondary market. Old Clynelish, produced before the distillery was rechristened Brora, have gained a huge following globally as people were charmed by the story and the characterful liquid the two distilleries produced. Now Brora is set to be re-opened, these single malts will only become more valuable. While his collection is no-doubt impressive – exact bottlings are not disclosed – there are some unicorns which still elude Valentin.   “Rather bizarrely and inexplicably, I prefer fatter spirits and fresher wines,” Valentin says, “in both cases with as little straight oak influence as possible. So, fat distillates, such as some coastal malts, some Jamaican rums etc. In wine, that would be the bright whites, Jura, Savoie, Rueda, Pacherenc, Irouleguy, Alsace, Wachau and Andalusia.”    “I know oak is crucial,” he adds, “you just shouldn’t feel it as such, according to my personal taste. But I insist, that’s personal.” Oak is a topic Valentin returns to several times. He feels it is the low-hanging fruit when it comes to innovation in the Scotch whisky industry.   “Sure, there are a few innovations around the casks,” he says, “but all makers use more or less the same.” The woods used are usually more active, which allows producers to sell much younger whisky for a good price while widening the ranges at the same time, he says.   “I’m not saying that’s bad,” he quickly adds, “but not many people are talking about the distilling regimes, the stills and so on, which was the number one topic 20 years ago.” He continues: “It is now all about wood. But, when we talk about wood that includes their flavouring with other spirits, wines, or even whiskies from other distilleries such as some peated ones, which is the latest trend, to peat single malts by doing some in-cask blending rather than bother with brewing and distilling some peated malt. “So, cutting corners for sure but on the other hand, I believe the average quality has risen pretty sharply. So, all remains good and well…”  This seems to be Valentin’s baseline. The whisky world might have changed but he believes it is the same at its core. There is an increase in branding and marketing (which is likely a source of joy and consternation for an ad man), there are more malts, and for the past five or six years, more distilleries from almost all countries.   “I’m not bored yet,” he says in his frank way, “and in general, whisky has got better on average, even if there are fewer utter glories and fewer total duds.”  If a man with Valentin’s reputation of no-holds-barred honesty is broadly happy, then we probably all should be too.   Browse all Scotch whisky  or  read more Editorial 

Serge Valentin is one of the most well-respected people in the fine spirits world. For decades, whisky enthusiasts have parted with thousands of pounds based on his reviews alone. Holly Motion asks him how it all began – and how the industry has evolved since he started writing about whisky for fun

Serge Valentin on the art of collecting, the role of the critic, and the changes he’s witnessed in the Scotch whisky industry over the past 20 years

Serge Valentin – the Joker in the pack

Serge Valentin: the Joker in the pack

There are myriad fascinating twists and turns in Scotch whisky’s long and storied past. From dizzying boom times to disastrous downturns, the distilling landscape – and the major players within it – has been redrawn countless times. 
There's one era, however, that is legendary – whisky's "golden age". Between the 1950s and '80s, some of the industry's most nuanced single malts were crafted. These are now widely regarded as the greatest ever released, which is reflected in the eyewatering secondary market prices – should they ever appear on the auction block. 
These perfectly imperfect, characterful and wonderfully unique liquids, produced at distilleries that no longer exist, or exist in a very different way today, will never be bottled again – making them real unicorns for whisky collectors. 
To understand what makes them so special, it is important to first appreciate just how little liquid exists from this time. The single malt whisky market was unfathomably small before and during this period and entirely dwarfed by blends. A mere fraction of a distiller’s finest liquid would be bottled as a single malt. These minuscule quantities were also made via practices that are now lost in the annals of history, making them more desirable for collectors. 
For context, Scotch whisky was largely made as it always had been until the 1950s, drawing on traditional methods that had been passed down for centuries. Distillers would use their sight, smell and taste to determine when a liquid was ready to cask, and later, bottle. Whisky-making took mastery and patience – something producers could ill afford when demands on the industry intensified and there was a concerted push to produce more for less during the 1970s. While many producers made these changes around the same time, they didn’t all happen at once, creating a wonderfully varied time capsule of whiskies. 
The 1960s – when some of these great bottlings were produced – was sandwiched in between two vastly different decades. Production in the ‘50s was steady but small. By the 1970s, however, distillers – both large and small – were forced to increase their output by almost double, and names that had fallen silent were reawakened once more as global demand for Scotch whisky grew. 
Sadly, by the mid-1970s, the tide started to turn. The bountiful supply of whisky was not met by demand, resulting in a devastating whisky loch in the 1980s and some of the most difficult years the Scotch whisky industry has ever endured. Swathes of distilleries were forced to close, including the now-legendary Port Ellen and Brora – both of which shut their doors in 1983. This depression continued well into the 1990s with a further 20 casualties (of these, only three ever reopened), before the pendulum finally swung back in the early 2000s when the seemingly unquenchable thirst for single malt whiskies, that is still in full force today, began. 
From the 1950s onwards, holders of the increasingly frayed purse strings sought to reduce inefficiencies in the traditional, labour-intensive practice of whisky-making – which defined the golden age. With the introduction of modern, more mechanised, safer processes, it was a new dawn for Scotch whisky.  During this period in history, every single stage of whisky production was “streamlined”. The money men closed floor maltings, introduced distillers’ yeast, reduced fermentation times, installed semi-lauter tuns, made the switch to indirect-fired stills, replaced worm tubs with shell-and-tube condensers, and introduced ex-Bourbon barrels. By the end of the 1970s, you could almost count on one hand the number of distillers who retained traditional methods. 
It’s important to remember that tweaking one of these processes can alter the entire flavour profile of a whisky – just ask Glenfarclas who reverted back to direct-firing their stills after their new-make spirit lost its characteristically heavy and oily profile during their ill-fated flirtation with steam in 1981. And yet, in many instances, producers permanently changed many of these processes. Traditional practices and know-how that varied slightly at every distillery began to be outsourced as they turned to professional maltsters and installed modern, industrial-scale equipment that increased efficiencies and consistency but in some cases compromised the craft and character of the final spirit profile. 
“Every distillery has its own story and evolution of style,” whisky authority Serge Valentin explains, “their own ups and its downs.” 
Valentin was ahead of his time when he started collecting single malt Scotch, almost exclusively from Old Clynelish and Brora. He couldn’t possibly have predicted what his passion project of buying as many different bottlings as he could “simply because they were [his] favourites”  would become. 
Both Clynelish and Brora – as it would be known – produced heavily peated malt during the late 1960s and early ’70s. Bottlings from this time until 1983, when Brora became a victim of the whisky loch and fell silent, have become highly collectable in recent years. Old Clynelish bottlings, (Valentin’s favourites), which are robustly distinctive with aromas of scented wax and heather, are astonishingly rare and modern collectors clamber over one another to get their hands on these golden-age gems for many times the price Valentin would have paid. 
Stephen Rankin has been fortunate to sample whiskies from one of the most remarkable single malt libraries in the world at Gordon & MacPhail. His team is able to pull out liquids from what he calls “pre-evolutions within distilleries” thanks to his family’s foresight to buy barrels from cash-strapped producers who were selling their stocks for survival. The Elgin-based independent bottler had the luxury and fortitude to bide their time and store casks that would otherwise have been bottled young or blended. He has a particular affection for single malts from what was Milton Distillery, known since 1951 as Strathisla, which he describes as a “great example of a whisky that has the flavours of this past era.” 
Independent bottlers like Gordon & MacPhail played a vital role in bringing many of these now-legendary whiskies into the world. One man in particular, Silvano Samaroli, was responsible for bottling single malts that are now widely regarded as some of the greatest ever released.  
Rome-based Samaroli released his first Scotch whisky series in 1968 in the form of the now-iconic, dumpy Cadenhead bottlings – making him the first independent Scotch whisky bottler outside the United Kingdom. Today, Samaroli’s Bowmore, Glen Garioch, and  Springbank releases are held in especially high regard and his  Laphroaig single malts from 1967 and 1970 are in a league of their own. 
“The late 1960s to the ’80s is definitely one of the most remarkable periods,” Samaroli’s Daniele Liberati says, “largely due to the appearance of certain expressions for the first time.”  
“We started to propose different bottlings, moving away from the classic blends and official distillery releases,” Liberati adds. These included single-cask expressions, numbered bottlings and cask-strength releases, all of which are commonplace today but were revolutionary at the time.
 
In recent years, a handful of new distillers have turned to old whisky-making practices in an attempt to recapture some of its magic. Fledgling Speyside distiller Dunphail, for instance, has faithfully – and at great cost – installed traditional floor maltings, direct-fired stills and wooden, open washbacks where fermentation times are considerably longer than the industry average, to produce a fruit-forward, oily, medium-bodied Speyside whisky. Today, however, these traditional methods are always adopted in conjunction with modern practices in order to achieve all the desirable characteristics of yore in a more efficient way.   While there is the temptation to look back on this era with a rose-tinted view, as there are undeniably some exceptional bottlings from this time, it is wrong to believe that all whisky produced in the golden age was of the same standard. Whisky-making 40 to 50 years ago was imperfect, there was very little consistency in quality and for one good cask, a distiller would likely have 10 or 20 bad ones that never saw the light of day.  It’s also important to appreciate that many of these modernisations were vital to guarantee the safety of distillery workers as several stages in production were unstable. These advancements have also resulted in unprecedented consistency. While nuance and singularity might have been sacrificed, it’s now incredibly hard to find a bad dram.   As times evolve – as they inevitably do – it’s highly unlikely whisky from Scotland’s golden age will ever not be considered precious.    Browse all Scotch whisky or read more Editorial

Some of the most exceptional single malts ever released were produced in an era affectionately known as “the golden age”. Bottlings from this time are painfully scarce and have gained near-mythic status among whisky enthusiasts. Holly Motion explores why whiskies from this age are so precious

Exploring the golden age of malt whisky and its most coveted bottlings that are widely considered some of the greatest single malts ever released.

The golden age of malt whisky

The golden age of whisky

For the last half-century, The Dalmore have been masters of their craft and created a luxury icon that has transcended spirits. The 12-pointed stag that graces every bottle of the Highland single malt is instantly recognisable and synonymous with quality.  But just how did this Scotch whisky distillery rise through the ranks and create a lasting legacy? How has The Dalmore become a luxury icon? The Dalmore has a long and enviable history dating back to 1839, filled with stories of valour, craftsmanship and larger-than-life characters. The single malt’s rich, chocolate, orange and subtle spice character is largely thanks to the distillery’s enviable partnership with famed Sherry bodega González Byass. This century-old relationship has ensured the distiller has maintained a steady supply of the finest Sherry casks at times when most Scotch producers were forced to mature their spirit in cheaper alternatives.   For more than 50 years, these casks have been presided over by one of the most famous faces (and noses) in Scotch whisky, Master Blender, Richard Paterson OBE. The statesman-like savant has pioneered cask maturation and produced rich, characterful whiskies that have commanded hundreds of thousands of pounds at auction. Among the many records to its name, The Dalmore was the first distiller to break the £100,000 mark for a single bottle in 2010 with its 64-year-old. In the years that have followed, The Dalmore has broken its own records numerous times.  The history of The Dalmore  The Dalmore distillery was founded by entrepreneur Sir Alexander Matheson in 1839. Matheson sold the distillery, located on the shores of the Cromarty Firth north of Inverness, to the three Mackenzie brothers in the late 1800s. The distillery stayed under family ownership for almost 100 years until it was bought by Glasgow-based Whyte & Mackay in 1960.   Whyte & Mackay quickly increased capacity from six stills to eight, and ceased malting barley on site on the 1980s.  Between 1990 and 2014, Whyte & Mackay pin balled between owners until Philippines-based brandy producer Emperador bought it for £430 million. Throughout the many changes in ownership, Master Blender Richard Paterson OBE has remained a constant.  Another constant is the iconic 12-pointed stag that adorns every bottle of Dalmore. This honour was bestowed upon the Mackenzie clan after Chief Coin of Kintail saved King Alexander III from certain death when a Highland stag charged at him.   The Dalmore – Gaelic for “large field” – has largely remained open throughout its history, only closing for a brief period during the First World War, when the Royal Navy took refuge on the grounds. When they moved on, the buildings required considerable work to repair damage from an explosion. Then-owner Mackenzie successfully took the Royal Navy to court to get compensation for the damage.  Before 2002, The Dalmore almost solely contributed to Whyte & Mackay blended malts and was not widely available beyond a 12 Year Old. Whyte & Mackay gradually started to increase the single malt range and within a few short years were shattering record prices at auction.   In 2022, plans were announced to expand the distillery and visitor centre. These included the demolition of a building that once held the distillery’s malting boxes to make way for a new production area. The Dalmore plans to install exact replicas of the existing eight wooden wash backs and four pairs of Loch Lomond stills. Once it is operational, circa 2024, the existing distillery will be closed and renovated. Rumour has it that this site will also be turned into a production facility bringing the Highland distiller’s annual capacity to nine million litres– such is the demand for Dalmore and single malt Scotch whisky more widely.  Richard Paterson OBE  It’s impossible to talk about The Dalmore without talking about their Master Blender of 50-plus years, Richard “the Nose” Paterson OBE. Over five decades, Paterson has built the global reputation of the single malt with his pioneering cask programme, unwavering quality ethos and million-pound nose. Paterson’s high-spirited presentations around the globe are legendary. It’s no exaggeration to say he hassingle-handedly converted hundreds and thousands of single malt disciples during his tenure for the distillery. But Paterson is far more than just a showman, his nose was at one point reportedly insured for £1.6 million – such are his olfactory talents and invaluable master blending skills.    Paterson started his whisky education at the tender age of eight when his father started teaching him how to nose spirits at their family specialist blending, bottling and brokerage company. At just 26 years old, the young Glaswegian landed the top whisky job of Master Blender at Whyte & Mackay – becoming the third generation in his family to hold this enviable title.   In 2020, at the age of 71, Paterson marked his 50th anniversary in the whisky industry. The same year, Paterson embarked on a world tour celebrating his tenure, promoting The Paterson Collection, which later sold for £1 million. Soon after, the Master Blender appointed former Compass Box Whisky Maker Gregg Glass as his successor and announced that he would be stepping back from day-to-day duties at Whyte & Mackay to focus on Dalmore.   The Dalmore distillery character   Arguably, the two biggest influences on The Dalmore’s iconic taste profile are the stills and the time spent in Sherry and wine casks.   For over a century, the Highland distillery has maintained a close relationship with famed Sherry bodega González Byass. This partnership has enabled The Dalmore to mature its new-make whisky in the finest Sherry casks when few others could afford to.    Typically, The Dalmore’s new-make spirit slumbers in ex-Bourbon casks for its initial maturation period before it is transferred into a Sherry or wine cask. Secondary maturation at The Dalmore is often longer than the industry average to ensure as much of the desired characteristics are imparted as possible.  For some of the distiller’s most coveted whiskies, The Dalmore has matured its whisky in butts that have previously held Matusalem Oloroso Sherry from González Byass – this is a type of award-winning Oloroso that has been aged for a minimum of 30 years, sweetened with approximately 25% Pedro Ximénez. The Dalmore continually pushes the envelope when it comes to secondary maturation, finishing its single malts in wine casks multiple times and even experimenting with casks that have previously held tequila, Calvados and Cognac. Dalmore’s coveted King Alexander III bottling was finished in a total of six different cask types: Port, Madeira, Marsala, Cabernet Sauvignon, Bourbon and Matusalem Oloroso Sherry.   The Dalmore’s new-make spirit is perfect for long maturation periods. Every stage of the production process is centred around quality – from the water source to the barley, to the production equipment, Dalmore insists on using the best materials possible.  Loch Morie, located 11 miles from the distillery, is The Dalmore’s pure water source that flows from the River Alness to its mouth just below Alness. The river runs close by the distillery and is notable for its typically Highland characteristics.  The Dalmore also sources its high-quality golden barley locally from the rich coastal soils of Ross and Cromarty.   Fermentation times at The Dalmore are slightly longer than the industry average at 50 hours. The current distillery set-up at The Dalmore is one of the most complicated in whisky production. The unique size and shape of the Loch Lomond stills enable the team to replicate the effect of shorter and longer still necks to increase or decrease the level of alcohol vapours that condense and return to the still for re-distillation, commonly referred to as reflux.   The Dalmore’s wash stills are unusual in that they have flat tops, which maximises reflux and copper contact. The Dalmore believes these two factors produce a more desirable malty, fruity and northern Highland spirit style with a robust body that is perfect for extended maturation. The spirit stills are also atypical because of their unique cooling jackets, which are the oldest pieces of equipment on site as they date back to 1874. The oldest stills at The Dalmore were installed at this time and the younger ones joined them in 1966. Currently, The Dalmore has four pairs of stills but this number is rumoured to be increasing in the next few years.   Despite its impressive output of circa 4.2 million litres annually, approximately only 5% of the distillery’s production is bottled as single malt. The vast majority of the whisky produced at the distillery is destined for Whyte & Mackay blends.   Dalmore single malts   The Dalmore’s core range, The Principal Collection, has expanded over the years and now includes a selection of age statement (12-, 15-, 18-, 21-year-old) and non-age statement (Port Wood Reserve, Sherry Cask Select, Cigar Malt Reserve, King Alexander III) whiskies. Dalmore also releases a smattering of highly anticipated and keenly sought-after distillery exclusives.   Some of the most collectable Dalmore bottlings   The Paterson Collection – The Paterson Collection is arguably the pinnacle of the modern era of whisky-making at The Dalmore and showcases esteemed Master Blender Richard Paterson’s lifetime’s work. The collection, launched to mark his 50th anniversary in the industry, comprises 12 remarkable single malts drawn from the Highland distiller’s impressive library, the oldest of which dates back to 1926. Four years after launch, The Dalmore Paterson Collection sold for £1 million.  Dalmore 62 Year Old – For a time, the Dalmore 62 Year Old held the title of the most expensive single malt ever sold.Only one dozen 62-year-old Dalmore single malts were released in 2002. The vatting of four casks filled in 1898, 1876, 1926 and 1939 fetched almost double its pre-sale estimate of £40,000-50,000 in 2017 and has only become more desirable since.   Dalmore 64 Trinitas – The Dalmore 64 Trinitas is one of the most special single malts ever bottled. After the unprecedented demand for the Dalmore 62, the distiller returned to its archive and unearthed something exceptional. The last remaining liquid from the blend which makes up the 62-year-old (from 1868, 1878, 1926 and 1939 vintages) was blended with liquid from the 1940s and left to slumber in a bespoke nine-litre cask seasoned with ultra-aged Dalmore and very old Matusalem Oloroso and a Pedro Ximénez from González Byass. Only three bottles of the Dalmore 64 Trinitas were ever released. Two sold for £100,000 in 2010 and the third sold for £120,000 in 2011.  Dalmore Constellation Collection – The Dalmore Constellation Collection isa highly collectable 21-bottle set of single-cask vintage whiskies spanning 1964 to 1992. Available individually, the younger vintages’ starting prices are £2,000; the entire collection carries an estimate of $275,000. It’s rare for a full set to become available but it has happened to much furore.   Dalmore Quintessence – The Dalmore Quintessence is one of the special single malts released to commemorate Master Blender Richard Paterson’s 50th anniversary in the whisky industry. After an initial maturation period in American oak, Dalmore Quintessence was finished in five different red wine casks (Zinfandel, Pinot Noir, Syrah, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon) for five years before being married together – at the time, this was an industry first. The name Quintessence was chosen because it means fifth element.   Dalmore L’Anima – Dalmore is no stranger to collaborating with industry legends. The Dalmore L’Anima is the result of a partnership between Richard Paterson OBE and Michelin-starred chef Massimo Bottura. The rare, 49-year-old single malt is a marriage of three rare casks which previously housed Graham’s vintage Port pipes, 40-year-old González Byass Pedro Ximénez and small-batch Bourbon barrels. The single bottle of L’Anima– which means “soul” in Italian – sold for £108,900 at an online charity auction in early 2019.  Dalmore Decades – The Dalmore Decades are multiple-bottle collections of some of the oldest whiskies ever released by the Highland distillery.   Twenty-five sets of four bottlings from 1979, 1980, 1995 and 2000 form the Dalmore No 4 Collection, which carries a recommended sale price of £100,000.   Only 15 sets exist of the Dalmore No 5 Collection, which includes expressions from 1967, 1979, 1980, 1995 and 2000 – this comes with a recommended price of £200,000.  Dalmore No 6 is currently the most expensive collection in the Dalmore Decades series. The six-bottle set with vintages from 1951, 1967, 1979, 1980, 1995 and 2000 sold for $US1.1 million.   The Luminary Series – The Dalmore Luminary Series is a collaboration between four individuals who are at the top of their respective field: Richard Paterson, world-renowned architect Kengo Kuma, Gregg Glass and Maurizio Mucciola.  The first release in the duo is The Rare, an extremely limited 48-year-old single malt; the second is the more accessible 15-year-old expression, The Collectible.   The Luminary Series, introduced in 2022, is the first time The Dalmore has released two special liquids at stratospherically different price points (circa $100,000 for The Rare and $245 for The Collectible). A mere three decanters of The Rare exist which was created by Paterson and Kuma. The Collectible which was finished in ex-Amarone casks and Kintsugi casks – built from staves of mizunara and Scottish oak from The Dalmore estate – is the brain chid of Paterson and Kuma protégés, Gregg Glass and Maurizio Mucciola.  Browse The Dalmore whiskies and all whisky listings 

The Dalmore is one of the most revered Scotch whisky distillers in the world, famed for producing some of the most expensive single malt whiskies ever sold. But what is it that makes this Highland producer such a collectors’ darling? Holly Motion investigates 

Exploring how The Dalmore has become one of the most collectable names in Scotch famed for producing some of the most expensive single malt whiskies ever sold

Investigating the single malt icon, The Dalmore

Everything you need to know about The Dalmore

The remote Hebridean isle of Islay has an almost otherworldly quality about it. For centuries, this eerily beautiful and beguiling postage stamp of Scotland produced whiskies that elevated some of the world’s most well-known blended malts. In recent years, however, Islay has stepped out from the shadows and become one of the most lauded single malt regions in the world – a position cemented this month when a cask of Ardbeg sold for a record-breaking £16 million.   So just how did this small whisky-producing region become the most collectable name in the world?  Adam Hannett started working as Head Distiller at Bruichladdich, on the southwestern tip of the island, in 2006. He says the difference between Islay, and Islay whisky, then and now is “pretty transformative”. When he joined Bruichladdich, the Victorian distillery was six years into what would become one of the greatest distillery revivals the whisky industry has ever seen.   “Inside the distillery gates, we were at the beginning of our journey,” the Head Distiller tells me. This journey included distilling an organic spirit, running barley experiments and bringing barley-growing back to Islay. The latter, Hannett says, has “changed the landscape of the island completely”. He adds: “Gordon, our Assistant Distillery Manager, talks about how we’ve turned fields golden, which sounds a bit cheesy, but it’s true.”  Journey due east and you’ll find Bowmore – Islay’s oldest and one of its most coveted single malt producers located in the island’s capital. David Turner, who was born and raised on the island, has worked at the distillery for 30 years – for the past 10 as Distillery Manager.   “Thirty years ago we were producing a lot of our spirit for bulk, for blending purposes, and we had a few thousand tourists a year,” he tells me. “We probably had one full-time visitor centre manager and a couple of seasonal tour guides that would come on for the summer.  “I think we’ve now got nine full-time staff in our visitor centre who do tours all year round and we’ve moved away from bulk blended whisky to just being a single malt specialist now.”  During Turner’s career at Bowmore, the distillery has transformed from a lesser-known producer to one of the most collectable names in Scotch whisky. Black Bowmore, Turner says, “put us on the map for being collectable”.  “When we took these samples out the casks, the whisky colour was black,” he says, “the quality was phenomenal.”  This discovery was made in the 1990s, around the same time as the wider whisky world started to take notice of Islay after whisky writer Michael Jackson shone a spotlight on the island’s quality in his pivotal work, Complete Guide to Single Malt Scotch.   As a region, Islay has faced hardship and several distilleries have been temporary or permanent casualties. Port Ellen, one of Scotland’s so-called “Holy Trinity” of lost distilleries, is arguably the most well-known victim, closing its doors after the downturn in 1983. Ardbeg was also shuttered in 1991 and was saved by the grace of God (Glenmorangie) in 1997. Today, the region is booming and the number of producers has reached a healthy nine. This number will increase when Port Ellen is resurrected by owners Diageo imminently – an announcement met with unfettered excitement last year. These closures and shifting paradigms have created a thrilling market for collectors, as whisky enthusiasts search for bottlings from bygone eras. The 1950s through to 1970s is of keen interest as whisky was being produced on a much smaller scale via traditional methods.  Traditionally, Islay was associated with peated whisky. For a time, distillers like Laphroaig, Lagavulin and Ardbeg competed against one another to see who could produce the biggest peat bombs on the market, which divided opinion. Bruichladdich blew all the others out the water when it released Octomore 6.3 in 2015, which registered 258 phenol parts per million (the scale used to determine the peat levels of whisky). For context, prior to that release, the highest peat levels were circa 167 PPM, also from Bruichladdich.   “I think there’s a hugely diverse range of flavour in the whiskies being produced across Islay at the moment,” Bruichladdich’s Hannett tells me. “It makes defining an ‘Islay’ whisky quite challenging as there’s so much variety from one distillery to the next.   “The general public almost expects a heavy smoke, almost medicinal flavour from an Islay whisky but even within our heavily peated Port Charlotte range, we have quite a soft, heathery, barbecue smoke.”    “Islay is famous for its peated whiskies but Bowmore is not all about peated,” Turner adds. “Bowmore sits in the middle of Islay. The north of Islay is very, very lightly peated. The south is very heavily peated. We’re in between the north and the south in peating levels. We see ourselves, and call ourselves, mid-peated, or a perfectly balanced Islay whisky.”  The people of Islay – Ileachs to give them their proper name – are integral to the whisky industry on the Hebridean island. Many of the Master Distillers and Blenders are locals and the vast majority of the production team hails from the island with an average population of 3,000 people. One of the most famous Ileachs is Jim McEwan who started his career at Bowmore, where he later worked as Distillery Manager before he left to lead Bruichladdich’s resurrection in 2000. McEwan came out of retirement to spearhead independent bottler Hunter Laing & Co’s new £12 million Islay distillery, Ardnahoe, saying it was an offer he could not refuse and beyond his wildest dreams.    The distillery, located on a four-acre plot on Islay’s northern coast, between Caol Ila and Bunnahabhain, overlooking the Isle of Jura, became the ninth working distillery on the island when it opened in 2019. McEwan designed the pot stills, mash tun and mucked in with every aspect of production to create a new-make whisky that he says is everything he looks for from a classic Islay: fruit, flower, sweet notes from the mash tun, baked cereal notes, smoky flavour from the peat, and bracken, heather and wild plants from the bog land. McEwan says the spirit he’s produced at Ardnahoe is as good as anything he’s tasted in 56 years.    Islay is at an interesting point in its history. New distilleries are opening, lost names are coming back to life, and many of the old guard are reaching retirement and are being replaced by younger distilling talent. There, arguably, has never been a more interesting time in its whisky-producing history.    Hannett, who is on the younger side, says: “I’m excited to see how distilleries can continue to adapt to support the local community. We’ve got a special thing here, with a booming industry and nine working distilleries.”  Turner picks up the point: “It’s good to see the old distilleries are still thriving. The new ones have got a good future as well but they’ve got a good number of years before they get a good standard core range." He adds: “A good Islay whisky I would say is between 12, 15 to 18 years. So they’ve got a good few years to get to that, never mind becoming collectable.”  Turner has quietly been amassing a collection of his own since the early 1990s. “I was in since the very beginning,” he says. “I was lucky to be in at the right time and I’ve got a big collection. It’s not just quantity or some of the new releases. It’s old and rare and quality I’ve based mine on.”  Initially, Turner collected Bowmore and slowly started adding other Islay and Scotch limited releases to his collection. As interest in whisky grew, the Distillery Manager rejigged his collection to focus on Islay malts – at one point exclusively Bowmore, Laphroaig and Lagavulin. After a period of selling certain bottlings to buy other, more expensive ones, Turner now has an exclusively Bowmore collection. He doesn’t elaborate on this but he does add: “Aye, it’s got smaller but it’s got more quality and rarity attached to it.” One suspects it is quite something to behold.  As for his distillery, Turner says Bowmore has got “good quality stuff maturing” and “some good aged stocks”. “We were family-owned up until 1994 and the family and the directors at the time had good insight. They kept good aged stocks, so we’ve got good 30s, 40s, 50s – 51, 52-year-old whisky – maturing. This good aged stock will keep the collectability going.”  With impressive aged stocks slumbering at Bowmore and its neighbours, there’ll undoubtedly be more records broken in the coming years from this enchanting Scottish isle.    Explore all our Islay whiskies or read more Editorial 

Islay has cast its spell over the whisky cognoscenti for decades, driving independent and distillery bottlings ever higher. Holly Motion explores how this small Scottish island has bewitched fans and become the gold standard of whisky collectability  

Exploring why single malt whiskies from the remote Hebridean island of Islay have become the gold standard of collectability with Bruichladdich and Bowmore

Exploring Islay whisky’s popularity

The enchanting isle of Islay

America’s native spirit has never been in greater demand. After years in the doldrums with production at record lows of 500,000 barrels per year, Bourbon is experiencing one of the greatest Cinderella stories in the modern spirits industry era. At last count, the number of barrels maturing in the United States had swelled to 10.3 million per year, which is a whopping 436% increase since 1999.   The reasons for the pendulum swinging back in Bourbon’s favour are multiple. The introduction of the first single-barrel Bourbon from the mid-1980s, coupled with the classic cocktail revival in the late ’90s to early ’00s, started to pique interest. Within a few short years, the Old Fashioned cocktail and brands like Blanton’s and Pappy Van Winkle were appearing front and centre in some of the biggest TV shows and films in America. Drinkers and the wider whiskey world were starting to wake up to the fact that Bourbon was a seriously good spirit. Producers couldn’t fill barrels fast enough. There was new dawn for high-priced, collectable American whiskey – and bottlings were soon like gold dust.   “Right now, in Kentucky, if I go to a liquor store, I can’t find our products on the shelves,” Drew Mayville tells me. “They are all gone. People have bought them or they don’t even make it to the shelf.”  Mayville has worked in the alcohol industry for over four decades, for the first 23 years at Seagram’s (before “it was put up for sale and my bubble burst”) and for the past 18 years at Sazerac, which produces some of the most coveted Bourbons on the market (think Pappy’s, Blanton’s, E H Taylor and Eagle Rare) at its Buffalo Trace distillery in Kentucky.   “People think [the Bourbon boom] happened overnight but it didn’t,” the Master Blender and Director of Quality says.   “I would say about 10 or 15 years ago it started to make its cycle back to favour,” he adds. “Even Pappy Van Winkle, which is one of the most sought-after Bourbons that we make, didn’t happen overnight.”   Mayville has witnessed the cyclical nature of drinking trends throughout his career and seen the various booms and busts in the United States as tastes moved from dark spirits to white spirits and back again. He believes one of the reasons Bourbon is so popular right now is largely down to its approachability.   “American whiskey tends to be very palatable,” Mayville explains in his Canadian drawl. “Scotch is more of a learned taste; lots of people drink Scotch around the world because they are so used to it.  “Part of the reason that Bourbon is very palatable is the corn. It provides a lot of that sweet fruitiness,” Mayville adds.   In order to be called Bourbon, the spirit needs to be made from at least 51% corn. The second grain in 95% of Bourbon produced is rye, which gives it a spiciness. The other 5% of Bourbon has wheat in place of rye – these wheated Bourbons are softer, as the fruit notes from the corn are accentuated by the addition of wheat. (Straight rye whiskey is also made from corn and rye, but with the rye dominating, meaning it can’t be classed as Bourbon.)   Contrary to popular belief, Bourbon can be made anywhere in the United States but 95% of Bourbon is produced in Kentucky. Bourbon must be distilled no higher than 160 proof (80% alcohol) and matured in newly charred oak barrels.   Despite its current popularity, Bourbon does have a long distilling tradition; it was first produced in Kentucky in the 1780s when distillers discovered charring barrels mellowed corn whiskey. After a strong start, Bourbon struggled during the two World Wars and was heavily affected by the temperance movement and Prohibition in the United States. Sales recovered by the middle of the century and American whiskey entered something of a golden age in the 1950s.  Unfortunately, this prosperous period was short-lived when drinkers once again turned their backs on brown spirits in favour of white spirits in the 1960s and early ’70s, kickstarting the vodka revolution that has only recently started to wane. This about-turn resulted in the first American whiskey surplus – known as a lake in world whiskey and loch in Scotland. Producers were left with gallons upon gallons of surplus whiskey and inevitable closures followed.   “We kinda skipped a generation and now we’re going back that way,” Mayville says stoically.  Now, with sales more buoyant than ever, there is a rush to ramp up production – fast. Sazerac is in the process of spending an eye-watering $1.2 billion on the Buffalo Trace distillery in Frankfort, Kentucky. A new column still, cookers and boilers are all being installed to double capacity. New, 60,000-barrel warehouses – the largest in Kentucky – are also being built every four or five months, at a cost of circa $30 million. This is scale on an unprecedented level.   Buffalo Trace is not alone in this endeavour. Producers of Old Forester and Woodford Reserve Brown-Forman are increasing their distillery space, and the makers of Four Roses have spent more than $50 million on expansion. Global spirits behemoth Diageo has also invested a reported $115 million on a new distillery and four warehouses with a total capacity of 330,000 barrels for its Bulleit Bourbon and other, as yet unannounced American whiskey brands.  “We’ve been making more and more every single year but it’s just never enough,” Mayville tells me.   “It’s a lot of money and it’s a big risk because if people don’t buy the product in 10 years from now, you’re going to have a lake of whiskey,” Mayville adds with knowing caution.   It’s hard to imagine the current Bourbon boom going bust when producers are showing such confidence in the category and bottlings such as Pappy Van Winkle Family Reserve can sell on the secondary market for upwards $20,000, but there are no guarantees.   For Mayville, this change in fortunes is a real boon but his real focus is on the quality of the liquid and innovation at the stills – the sales figures are somebody else’s concern.    “The part that really excites someone who has been around as long as I have is doing new things and innovation,” he says with glee. Much to this industry veteran’s delight, this creativity is championed at the very top of his organisation.   “We can go away, do experimentations, spend money, and not even tell anyone – and it’s actually encouraged,” he says, still clearly unable to believe his good fortune.  Mayville says the American drinks market is great at keeping him honest, always expecting something that wows and excites them.  “We’re always, always trying to innovate, embrace that change, and try and make better products,” he adds.“ We run so many different experiments, trying to make better whiskeys. It’s hard to list them because there are so many. There are thousands of barrels ageing right now that are experiments.”   One of his most recent experiments was the Colonel EH Taylor 4 Grain, which was named one of the best whiskeys in the world in 2017 by Jim Murray in his Whisky Bible.    “You can’t predict exactly what’s going to happen,” the Master Blender says humbly. “We’re doing so many experiments – another one could well be one of the best whiskeys in the world.”   With creative genius like Mayville at the helm of some of these distilleries, continually striving for quality, it’s hard to see the Bourbon gold rush ending any time soon. One thing that is for sure, though, is whiskey lovers and collectors will continue to scramble for what little Bourbon there is on the market until distillers can mine their liquid gold. Browse all American whiskey or read more Editorial 

After some very challenging years, American whiskey producers feel like they’ve struck gold. Demand for Bourbon is at an all-time high and distillers can’t pump out enough liquid to meet a seemingly unquenchable thirst. Holly Motion investigates the Bourbon boom 

Exploring the reasons for the current Bourbon boom in the United States with Buffalo Trace’s Drew Mayville, who produces Pappy Van Winkle, Blanton’s and more

Exploring the Bourbon whiskey boom

Gold rush: the Bourbon boom

This year Michael Silacci is celebrating 21 years at Opus One. Taking over as winemaker for Napa’s first cult estate and arguably the region’s most famous property (a joint venture between Ch. Mouton Rothchild and Robert Mondavi) was no small task. But Silacci’s experience was almost unparalleled; he’d worked in the valley for 40 years, under some of the most iconic producers in the region’s history. In the 1980s, Silacci was mentored by America’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker, André Tchelistcheff at Beaulieu Vineyard. In the 1990s, he became the right-hand man of Napa legend Warren Winiarski at Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars. When he took the role at Opus One in 2001, he was making wine alongside Mouton’s winemaker Patrick Léon and Robert Mondavi’s son Tim Mondavi. Of all the many things he learnt from these mentors, it was their belief in him that really empowered him – and it was this that would shape his work ethic at Opus. Silacci understood the power of responsibility from a very young age. Working in his grandfather’s dairy farm at the age of 10, he was an essential cog in the operation. “He was a very practical man,” says Silacci of his grandfather, “and would allow me to get on with my work, without ever looking over my shoulder.” Silacci quickly learnt what was expected of him. Silacci found himself in a similar position in his first winemaking job. He had just finished his studies at the University of Bordeaux. While he had worked in wineries and vineyards before, up until that point he had never really been given any responsibility or allowed to make decisions. In a subsequent internship, he found himself under the mentorship of Bordeaux wine legend, Denis Dubourdieu (Ch. Doisy-Daëne), who turned to Silacci and said, “You have taken all the classes, so make the wine!” Dubourdieu instantly put his faith in Silacci’s abilities, which was hugely inspiring for the young winemaker.   It wasn’t long before Silacci was drawn back to the US and Napa where things were really starting to develop; first working at Beaulieu Vineyard, then at Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars. In the 1990s, Silacci witnessed a lot of change in the valley as phylloxera ravaged the region. “First, there was denial, then there was anger and finally we learnt from it,” he says. “If Napa was to survive as a wine-producing region, people had to work together to solve its problems.” The group effort that followed – experimenting with rootstocks and clones, and most importantly sharing their discoveries, seeking the right combination to sustain the region’s future –was inspirational. This was a problem that couldn’t be solved by the individual.  When the opportunity arose to join Opus One in 2001, Silacci leapt at the opportunity – but it wasn’t an easy start. Silacci was used to a hands-on role, working in the vineyard and winery. At Beaulieu Vineyard, he oversaw 28,000 acres, five vineyard management teams, five winemakers and 85 grape growers. Under Tchelistcheff and Winiarski, he had learnt how to read the valley – noting how fruit in the same vineyard changed where the soils did, that different parts of the same vineyard would ripen at different times. It was this understanding of Napa’s terroir that he wanted to bring to Opus. His first week, however, consisted of back-to-back office meetings. “Don’t ever schedule a week for me like that again,” he told his PA.  Silacci arrived at Opus One with his eyes wide open and mouth shut, wanting to observe how the operation was working – and where potential problems lay. While everyone knew what they were doing, h felt that a sense of collective responsibility – and the passion that comes with that sense of ownership – was missing.  In such a big organisation – operating as part of the Mondavi stable in Napa – he wasn’t going to be able to change things overnight, but Silacci didn’t waste any time in the vineyard. When he arrived, the viticultural teams worked across the brands. One week they would be pruning To Kalon (Napa’s prized vineyard, of which 100 acres goes into Opus One), and the next week they would be pruning vines for a $25 bottle of Chardonnay in Carneros. For Silacci, this didn’t make any sense, and the vines needed to be treated differently. He knew from experience that a permanent viticultural team taking ownership of the vines they cared for would improve the quality of the fruit. Within four weeks, he had two teams dedicated solely to the Opus One vineyards. Changing attitudes in the cellar was not so easy. “It was very difficult to integrate with the team,” admits Silacci. “They were very set in their ways and were not really interested in doing things differently.” Silacci identified that it wasn’t what they were doing, but their attitude towards doing it that he felt was wrong. “The cellar crew only did one thing at a time,” says Silacci. “That was their reason for doing something well.” But Silacci, true to form, took a different approach. “Any living thing, human or plant, has to have a sense of urgency,” he says. “If you give people too little work to do and vines too much water, they develop a sense of leisure, they get distracted and miss opportunities… But if you give people too much to do and the plant too little water, they develop a sense of anxiety. They are stressed, which is not healthy and they make mistakes.” Silacci’s goal was to find a middle path. More than that, like his mentors before him, he wanted them to take responsibility in what they did and, with that, instil more passion in the team. “I knew they understood the mechanisms of winemaking,” says Silacci, “but I didn’t know if they felt it. I don’t know if they are passionate about what they do.” He decided to split the cellar team into two teams of three. Each was given 22 rows of the top vineyard. “Between them they had to make all the decisions on pruning, suckering, fruit drop, harvest decisions – everything.” Each team would then make around 1,000 bottles each at the end of the year.  Projects like this, Silacci believes, not only gave his team a sense of autonomy and responsibility, but it helped build passion for what they were doing. “You create a sense of urgency, and you get back a sense of focus,” he says.  Silacci believes that a consensus among the team is key – but only if everyone is equally invested in the final product. Today he has a permanent team of five, who together create the final blend. They are also joined at the later stages by Mouton’s Jean-Emmanuel Danjoy and another of the Mondavi team. Typically, they produce over 50 blends each year before making their decision. And it’s the most important decision of the year. “Blending really is at the heart of Opus One,” Silacci says.  The idea is that everyone in the team has a voice – and everyone is listened to equally. He feels it took 10-15 years for the team to completely understand this consensus-driven approach.  While the theory may not always work, admits Silacci (“Ultimately it is my head on the chopping block”), his aim is to empower his team with responsibility. Like his mentors before him, he loves to give them autonomy in their role, allowing them to figure it out on their own – meaning they’re more invested in what they do. “We all have a blind spot,” he says, “But if you have people standing with you, looking out, they mask your and other people’s weaknesses and you build a circle of people each with their strengths,” he says. For Silacci, the collective – like a blend – is stronger than the individual. “The very best teams,” he says in a calming, zen-like tone, “are not circles, but spheres.” And that perfect sphere is what he continues to strive for at Opus. Find out more about and browse all listings from Opus One or read more Editorial 

Under the tenure of winemaker Michael Silacci Opus One has gone from strength to strength. But it’s not him or owners Mouton-Rothschild and Mondavi that are at the heart of its success; for Silacci, it’s all down to the power of collective responsibility

After 21 years at cult Napa estate Opus One, Michael Silacci believes much of his success lies in collective responsibility. Here’s why.

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