Throughout 2024, The Macallan has been celebrating its 200th anniversary. A time to honour the distillery’s history and the figures who have shaped its progress to becoming arguably the world’s most collectible single malt. However, the focus of celebrations is as much on the future as the past. In that spirit, its most significant and aspirational release of this landmark year has been announced and the big surprise is that it contains both the longest aged and the most recently distilled whiskies The Macallan has ever released.

The Macallan began life on the same Speyside estate where the distillery and its spiritual home, Easter Elchies House, still reside. In 1824, a new licence to distil brought Speyside whisky into the light. Although the region’s version of whisky was the most prized in Scotland and beyond (even by royalty), production had previously been hiding in the shadows of the Highland hills. The new Excise Act made legal distilling far more lucrative, especially if it was done to the exacting standards already established in Speyside. Farmers, such as The Macallan’s founder Alexander Reid, were able to use their barley crop to produce malt whisky we’d recognise today.

We would probably recognise it more readily than the connoisseur of two centuries back, even 100 years ago, who generally enjoyed it as part of a blend. It was in the 1980s that single-malt whisky really took off and The Macallan soon became a sought-after dram under its own name.

A distillery with an impeccable history, almost a watchword for tradition and luxury, suddenly launched itself into a new age in 2018. Its new distillery was a stunning departure from the norm, while simultaneously being quietly low impact on the natural beauty of the area. From the outside, the Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners-designed building is a series of grassy mounds that meld into the landscape – other than from one angle, where windows reveal The Macallan’s signature curiously small stills, much like the ones favoured by Alexander Reid back in 1824.

It is this duality – the celebration of the past and the celebration of the future – that has shaped the extremely limited creation, TIME:SPACE (appropriately, only 200 bottles available, price on application). This houses two whiskies – neither of them in anything so mundane as a bottle. In one chamber is some of the first liquid to run off the stills of the new distillery in 2018. In the other is the longest-aged Macallan ever, at 84 years old.

As master whisky maker Kirsteen Campbell says of her work and that of her team, ‘We get to time travel – selecting whisky from the past crafted by our predecessors, while simultaneously laying down casks for future generations of whisky makers and consumers.’

For the more venerable whisky in TIME:SPACE, Campbell has merged two The Macallan casks distilled in 1940 (distillation continued, but at extremely limited levels, through the war, so this is an incredibly rare vintage). One was a first-fill American oak butt, the other a second-fill European oak butt – but both were seasoned with sherry in Jerez de la Frontera, as is the Macallan way.

The Macallan’s Master Whisky Maker Kirsteen Campbell

TIME:SPACE tasting notes:

Kirsteen Campbell’s notes on the 1940 Vintage: ‘For The Macallan, it is unusually a peated whisky, a combination of a European oak cask and an American oak butt, both sherry-seasoned. It has an aroma of dark chocolate-coated ginger, sticky dates and leather, with antique oak and hints of coffee. On the palate: baked peaches, aniseed, blackberry jam, woodsmoke, resin and caramelised sugar. It has an extremely long finish with notes of dark chocolate and toasted oak.’

Kirsteen Campbell’s notes on the 2018 Vintage: ‘This is from our curiously small stills, which, although in a different still house, are the same design as the ones that produced the 1940 whisky. And some of the familiar characteristics immediately come through on the nose – lovely orchard fruits, pears and apples. But this has been aged in a single sherry-seasoned American-oak hogshead, and you immediately get lovely, sweet and rich toffee notes. And just a little hint of oak spice in the background. This is 54.9 per cent ABV, so it has wonderful viscosity, a real syrupy flavour. There’s shortbread there, golden sultanas. The fresh apples from the nose transform into baked apple.’

Brummell adds: The high ABV is a great reflection of the youth of this whisky – it would have been a sacrilege to bottle it diluted. But it carries its proof comfortably, largely because of a delicious, honeyed mouthfeel. There’s a distinct crystalised ginger sweet and spicy note that really elevates this expression too.

There is a further release – TIME:SPACE Mastery (£1,100, available to purchase from selected retailers) – assembled by lead whisky maker, Euan Kennedy. Kirsteen Campbell says, ‘Euan led this and his goal was to bring all that is The Macallan to this whisky – we had lots of long conversations with the creative team and with our warehouse team in a collaborative effort. TIME:SPACE Mastery is inspired by whisky masters of the past. So, we explored the full extent of our warehouses to capture the complex influences of seasoning, oak origin, cask size and distillery character in one bottle of whisky. So, at the heart of it, of course, is sherry-seasoned European oak – that’s what everyone expects. But we also use American oak seasoned with sherry. Then, there are ex-bourbon casks. Although it’s not core to The Macallan, it has been part of our history. So, we wanted to give some of that to the whisky. Euan finessed and finessed and finessed this whisky to build layers and complexity, as well as achieve the right balance.

‘In total, it was 14 different cask types, when you also take into account different sizes –butts, puncheons, hogsheads and barrels – and whether they were first-fill or refill. The Macallan is mostly aged in first-fill sherry casks, but we wanted some refill in there to bring some distillery character.

‘You’ll see this whisky doesn’t carry an age statement and that was very deliberate. We wanted complete freedom to look through the portfolio and choose whiskies based on flavour. But, when you nose and taste this, you’ll know that it’s well aged.’

TIME:SPACE Mastery tasting notes:

Kirsteen Campbell: ‘On the nose, beautiful, sweet baked figs. A lovely honeycomb note; sweet honey. Soft, gentle baking spices like baking spices… cinnamon, nutmeg and a really soft ginger note. There’s a tropical fruit hint, too. Euan described it as dried mango; I think there’s a bit of papaya in there as well. On the palate, it’s certainly a tropical burst of charred pineapple, with a spicy sweetness – baked custard with nutmeg. The recognisable Macallan sherry-influenced notes – dates, sultanas, wood spices – come through underneath. It has wonderful balance between elegance and depth.’

Brummell adds: On the nose, it carries perfumed fruity notes, which make this an unusual expression worth seeking out. On the palate, that baked custard is, for us, an original warm pastel de nata from Belém, with a dusting of cinnamon; and there’s a surprising note of toasted hazelnuts tossed in salt and chilli.

These extraordinary whisky releases are an indication that The Macallan is not 200 years old but, as it claims, “200 years young”.

themacallan.com