Glenfarclas unveils third annual decanter
The third edition in Glenfarclas’ annual decanter series is a rare 24-year-old single malt that was bottled at the turn of the millennium.
In 2022, family-owned distillery Glenfarclas revealed the debut release in its decanter series with a 25-year-old bottled at natural cask strength, followed by a 20-year-old Port pipe edition in 2023. This year’s edition came from cask number 12, filled on 1 January 2000 by current Glenfarclas chairman John Grant, and bottled on 30 July 2024. Like the previous editions, there are only 600 decanters available in the UK. The resulting liquid was bottled at 47.4% ABV, and comes in a Glencairn crystal decanter. Peter Donnelly, spirits director of Pol Roger Portfolio, Glenfarclas’ UK distributor, says the idea was to create “five decanters over five years” to represent the “five generations of the Glenfarclas family and the styles they would choose”. Donnelly says that the product comes at an “affordable collectible price point” of between £450 and £550. When it comes to selecting the casks for the Decanter series, Donnelly says: “We’re looking for something we haven’t bottled before, or perhaps the cask has a nice story behind it or an unusual story. “With the very first 25-year-old cask strength, we’d never bottled that up in a decanter series or any decanter. “The natural strength was 49.4% ABV so it is quite high, with a normal standard 25-year-old being 43%.” Donnelly says of the planning process: “It usually takes anything between five and six months to actually create these things and bring them to market and get them bottled. It’s quite a long process. First and foremost, the quality of the whisky has got to be outstanding, and when you taste [the 24-year-old], it really is something special.” He also noted that the use of Port pipes for the previous edition was not typical for the brand, which traditionally matures its whisky in Sherry casks. Furthermore, Pol Roger Portfolio is releasing a limited edition box for Glenfarclas 25 Year Old for Christmas in the UK, containing three Glencairn glasses and a Glencairn water jug. This will be a limited release and available from 1 September 2024 for RRP £299. Glenfarclas has had a decades-long relationship with fellow family-owned Scottish business Glencairn. “John Grant was the first person in the whisky industry to order from Glencairn more than 40 years ago,” Donnelly says. “So for any single cask or bespoke bottlings, we use Glencairn as our crystal partner.” The 24-year-old whisky is the third edition in Glenfarclas’ five-strong series of decanters, with the fourth due out in 2025 and the final release coming out in 2026. Donnelly teases collectors, saying: “Watch this space because for the people who have all five decanters, there’ll be something a bit special coming afterwards.” Last year, Glenfarclas launched 50-year-old whisky to mark the 50th anniversary of its chairman, John Grant.
