In early 1940, the Scotch whisky trade had been pummeled by international upheaval for 20 years. Prohibition in America was adopted by a worldwide financial despair, after which the start of World Warfare II. 

The bombs had already began falling on Scotland when, on the third day of February, a refill sherry cask — Cask No. 336, to be exact — was stuffed on the Glenlivet distillery. The cask had been chosen, and the whisky bought, by Gordon & MacPhail, which by then had been sourcing, ageing, and bottling Scotch single malts for greater than 40 years.

Distilleries in Scotland continued producing whisky through the battle, albeit with extreme restrictions on their capability; they wouldn’t return to pre-war manufacturing ranges till the early Nineteen Fifties. Cask No. 336 survived each the battle and, maybe much more miraculously, the postwar impetus to fulfill demand by bottling no matter was obtainable at a comparatively younger age. 

After being delivered from Glenlivet to Gordon & MacPhail’s warehouses in Elgin within the late Nineteen Sixties, the cask remained there for almost six extra many years, till 2025. At 85 years previous, it’s the longest-aged Scotch whisky ever launched commercially. 125 bottles of this historic single malt are being made obtainable worldwide, with a instructed retail worth of £125,000 (about $168,000).

When Cask No. 336 was laid down, superannuated bottlings weren’t a priority amongst whisky drinkers. Actually, single malts typically had been barely thought-about a distinct segment market — almost all whisky produced on the time wound up in blends, and the one malt class didn’t actually begin to make waves till the ’80s and ’90s. Nevertheless, George Urquhart, who spent greater than 65 years with Gordon & MacPhail, beginning in 1933, was many years forward of his time in recognizing the worth of each single malts and long-term cask ageing. 

“George [was] actually starting to attach the dots between kind of spirit, kind of cask, high quality of whisky,” says Stephen Rankin, Urquhart’s grandson and at present director of status for Gordon & MacPhail. George Urquhart, alongside along with his father, John Urquhart, who’d been with the corporate since its founding in 1895, chosen the cask and the whisky.

In accordance with Rankin, three components clarify the whisky’s outstanding longevity. First was its placement in a super a part of Gordon & MacPhail’s warehouse: “Decrease factors within the warehouse close to the center of the constructing, which might be only a bit cooler, extra steady. One location, completely key, and it remained there for a very long time.” 

Second is the character of the cask. The American oak refill sherry cask is constructed from wooden that was roughly a century previous when harvested — considerably older than a typical trendy barrel — and the staves had been a lot thicker than these utilized in as we speak’s barrels. 

The third issue is the spirit itself, “the burden and character of the whisky,” as Rankin places it. “We knew it had a lot extra depth than a contemporary type, as a result of it had extra robustness. It had just a little bit extra sootiness and type of an industrial high quality… just a little bit heavier” than as we speak’s Glenlivets.

Rankin describes the whisky as having tropical fruit notes on the nostril. On the palate, he jokes, “This isn’t tasting previous and crumbly! Have you ever given me an 85 yr previous or a 35 yr previous?” He provides, “It’s candy, and it’s received that beautiful steadiness to it … nearly autumnal fruit. Ripe, wealthy pear, ripe apple, and beautiful plums. After which the end goes on and on, and it does that type of natural notice.”

To design the whisky’s packaging, Gordon & MacPhail enlisted American architect Jeanne Gang, whose initiatives embrace the Aqua Tower in Chicago, Invoice Clinton’s presidential library in Arkansas, and the Heart for Science, Schooling, and Innovation on the American Museum of Pure Historical past in New York. Evoking the Artistry In Oak theme, the hand-blown glass decanter is entwined and guarded by 4 solid bronze “branches.” 

“American oak knowledgeable the department design,” Rankin says, “and there is such a nod to the wooden that clearly is so necessary to Scotch whisky.”

Every of the 125 decanters is individually numbered. No. 1 will likely be auctioned via Christie’s, with bidding beginning on November 7 and ending on the twenty first. The proceeds from the public sale, minus prices, will likely be donated to American Forests, the oldest nationwide non-profit conservation group in america and a frontrunner in forest restoration. The successful bidder can even obtain a bespoke whisky tasting with a fourth-generation member of the family, a framed and signed sketch by Jeanne Gang that impressed the decanter, and the framed head of Cask #336 itself.

Each cask of whisky is exclusive, particularly within the extraordinary case of Cask No. 336. Nevertheless, it was one in every of 5 refill sherry casks stuffed at Glenlivet on the identical February day in 1940 for Gordon & MacPhail. One in every of them noticed the sunshine of day in 2021 as Generations 80 Yr Outdated. As for the opposite three, are they nonetheless slumbering in Gordon & MacPhail’s Elgin warehouse? Will we see the world’s first 90-year-old whisky in a couple of years? Rankin will solely say, “Timing is completely every little thing for us, and we’ll solely launch these kinds of whiskies after we know, ‘Proper. That is it. It’s completely improbable.’”