A rare bottle of 60-year-old Macallan whisky has sold at Christie’s auction house for £1.2 million, breaking all previous records set.
The bottle also features a label which was hand painted by Michael Dillon, a renowned Irish artist. The bottle was filled with whisky drawn from cask 263, which was filled in 1926, producing a further yield of twelve more bottles. These were split into sets of six, with each set bearing labels by artists Valerio Adami and Sir Peter Blake. 2018 has seen several of the Adami and Blake bottles reach record prices at auction, but the latest bottle has exceeded all expectations.
Christie’s international director of wine, Tim Triptree MW said:
“The sale represents a landmark moment in the whisky market. The results confirm the strength of the market for whisky.”
The auction of rare whiskies also included a 1919 Springbank which went for £132,000, a 50-year-old Yamazaki First Edition for £144,000 and a 50-year-old Macallan Lalique which achieved double its estimate at £144,000. Canny buyers of a limited edition Macallan Genesis released by the distillery in August, and who paid £495 for a bottle, saw their investment achieve £2,280 after just four months.
It is doubtful whether any of these whiskies will ever be poured into a fine engraved crystal whisky glass, or see the inside of a crystal decanter, and with the market for rare whisky very buoyant at the moment, it remains to be seen whether even more records will be broken.
