June Whisky Auction Highlights 2024

Welcome to June 2024's Whisky Auction Highlights blog! There's some superb single malt whiskies from the likes of Macallan, Springbank, Ardbeg and Lagavulin to tell you about, so we'll just get straight into it.

Official Bottlings

We’ve got some fantastic official distillery bottlings this month, both recent single malt releases and classic whiskies from the golden years. Recent top end releases include Glen Ord’s Singleton 40-year-old, which was the highlight of 2023’s Epicurean Odyssey series: a limited edition of 1716 bottles finished in rum casks and released at a great drinking strength of 45.9%.

We also have top class recent official 40-year-old bottlings from fellow Highland stalwarts Old Pulteney and Deanston, with the former being one of just 493 bottles released at 51.3% in 2012 (and still the oldest ever OB from the Pulteney distillery) and the latter a limited edition of 480 bottles finished in Oloroso sherry casks and bottled in 2016 at its natural cask strength of 45.6%. 

Let’s check out the Macallans quickly - we have some truly classic bottlings this month from the Speyside behemoth, including the early multi vintage Macallan 1958/9 25-year-old Anniversary Malt, a 1980s litre of Macallan 12-year-old, Macallan 18-year-olds distilled in 1977, 1978, 1982 and 1985, and the return of the legendary Macallan 1946 52-year-old. We also have some newer special edition Macallans including a pair of the old Macallan Replica bottlings and a clutch of Macallan Concept, Folio and Edition series bottlings.

To Islay now, and there’s some great single malts up for grabs. Classic golden era Islay single malt official bottlings this month include the turn-of-the-century Laphroaig 30-year-old (and some earlier 1980s 10-year-old and 15-year-old editions), plus the second edition of Ardbeg's massive 4.5 litre Mor 10-year-old, the return of the incredible white label early 1980s Lagavulin 12-year-old White Horse and the much-loved Lagavulin 1987 Distillers Edition from 2003.

Elsewhere on the magic isle, we’ve got all-time classics like Black Bowmore 1964 42-year-old, released in 2007 as the first bottling of the second Bowmore Trilogy series which also included Bowmore White and Bowmore Gold. Fans of more recently-released Islay OBs will also need to check out the trio of Bruichladdich Rock’ndaal bottlings released at recent Islay Festivals.

Other miscellaneous excellent distillery bottlings in this month’s whisky auction include the likes of Glenmorangie 1963 22-year-old and Tomatin’s fabulous 30-year-old Centenary bottling. This was one of just 1000 still-shaped 90cl (900ml) decanters distilled in the mid-1960s and released in 1997, so the whisky would have been distilled no later than 1967. The earlier Strathisla 35-year-old Bicentenary, meanwhile, was bottled in 1986 and therefore must have been distilled no later than 1951. 

We also have some great Glendronach official bottlings this month, including a rare Teachers-era Glendronach 8-year-old bottled in the late 1970s for the UK Armed Forces NAAFI overseas stores and a pair of the famous 1968 and 1976 vintage bottlings released in the mid-1990s.

We can’t finish this section without mentioning the great cornucopia of Campbeltown whiskies in this month’s auction. Highlights in this sale include 2004’s Springbank 32-year-old refill sherry cask limited edition, plus the famous Springbank and Longrow Rundlets & Kilderkins bottlings from 2012/3 and various recent and not-so-recent desirable Springbank, Longrow and Hazelburn editions.

Finally, there’s some lovely non-Scotch whisky official bottlings in this month’s auction, including gems from Pappy Van Winkle, Yamazaki and Jameson, with the latter including both the brown box and black box versions of the much-missed Jameson Rarest Vintage Reserve from 2007 - one of the greatest Irish whiskeys ever bottled.

Independent Bottlings

We’ve got a great lineup of independent bottlings coming up for grabs this month. We’ll start with Gordon & MacPhail’s chestnut-coloured Glen Grant 1958 bottled in 1998 after four decades of quiet maturation - these are always stunning drams.

Elsewhere, there’s some very exciting old bottlings from Signatory Vintage. Our ones to watch include a sherry butt Inchgower 1980 bottled as a 27-year-old in 2007, plus a dark sherry Braes of Glenlivet 1979, a lovely early Glenlivet 1968 released at 51.2% in 1994 and a Macallan 1988 19-year-old bottled in 2007.

That Signatory Macallan is just one of several rare indie Macallans in this month sale, with other examples including Duncan Taylor’s Macallan 1986 18-year-old, several mystery Macallans bottled by Prometheus and Crabbie and a private Macallan 1989 21-year-old bottled for Peter Zacharias at cask strength in 2010.

There’s a few other very tempting private bottlings this month, with highlights including 18-year-old Ben Nevis 2005 and Port Charlotte single casks and a pair of 25-year-old and 30-year-old Springbanks distilled in 1989 and 1992.

Miscellaneous great indie bottlings in this month’s sale include Douglas Laing’s Macduff 1976 24-year-old, a beautiful old Cadenhead’s dumpy black label Glenfarclas 1966 12-year-old bottled at 80 Imperial proof (45.7%) in 1979 and a few bottles of the excellent (not to mention historic) Springbank 1992 7-year-old bottled for Da Mhile - this cask strength belter was the very first whisky ever certified as organic by the UK Soil Association and is a fantastic young Springbank.

Lost Distilleries

A small but very desirable selection from Scotland’s closed distilleries this month. We’ll start with a pair of contrasting Rosebanks from Signatory Vintage - one is a younger dram from the final days of the original distillery in the form of Rosebank 1991 14-year-old, bottled at 43% from a trio of sister bourbon barrels in 2006; and a very exciting earlier vintage Rosebank 1967 26-year-old bottled from a pair of sister casks in Signatory’s classic dumpy inkpot bottles in 1994 at its natural strength of 51.7%. Just 250 bottles of this classic were released in March 1994 and there’s probably very few left now.

Gordon & MacPhail have a Rosebank this month too, a Connoisseurs Choice bottling of Rosebank 1990 released in 2006. G&M did quite a few early 1990s Rosebanks for the Connoisseurs Choice series and most of them are superb. 

We're not quite done with Gordon & MacPhail yet - there's also the small matter of a sherried Kinclaith 1967-1991 map label Connoisseurs Choice bottling, and a later Caperdonich 1998-2011 matured in refill sherry hogsheads and bottled at a hearty 46%. This is a fine example of the late period young Caperdonichs that don’t cost an arm and a leg and is well worth checking out if you haven’t yet tried this fantastic lost distillery.

Finally, we can’t finish this bit without celebrating the return of one of our most unusual ‘lost distillery’ bottlings - one of the remarkable 19th century Irish moonshine bottles we found back in 2019 has made a reappearance! This was one of over 100 bottles found covered in sphagnum moss in a secret room under a disused farm building in Co. Tyrone in Northern Ireland and these hand-blown bottles are beautiful artefacts - check out the whole story here.

Single Casks

There’s a veritable plethora of superb single cask single malts in this month’s Whisky-Online auction, as always. First class official single cask editions in this month’s sale include the outstanding Glenfarclas 1953 58-year-old bottled for Polish financial planners Wealth Solutions and a very promising sherry cask Ben Nevis 1998 12-year-old bottled in 2010. These gems line up alongside special edition distillery-only hand-filled bottles of Glendronach 1994 25-year-old, Glen Garioch 1997 21-year-old and Auchentoshan 2009 9-year-old - all from sherry casks and all at full cask strength.

Jumping over to Ireland briefly, there’s the latest (and last) Redbreast Dream Cask bottling from Midleton distillery - a 1985 vintage 38-year-old single pot still whiskey titled the Zenith edition. Bottled at its natural strength of 45.3%, this Redbreast Dream Cask spent 27 years maturing in a pair of second fill bourbon barrels before being transferred to a first fill Oloroso sherry butt cask 38404, and is one of just 822 50cl bottles.

Moving on to the indies and there are some very special gems coming under the hammer. Highlights this month include a Cadenhead’s Springbank 2001 19-year-old and an amazing string of single cask indie Islay single malts such as a Bunnahabhain 1989 28-year-old from the Thompson Bros up at Dornoch, Bruichladdich 2002 20-year-old from Rest & Be Thankful, and some of the greatest of shadowy Islay cartel The Syndicate’s extraordinary single casks of Lagavulin and Laphroaig.

That's it for this month's whisky auction highlights blog - check out the full auction here, Good Luck and Happy Bidding!