Blair Athol 2006-2022 - 16 Year Old - North Star Spirits - Cask Series 021 - Single Cask

Originally founded in 1798 as Aldour, Blair Athol was taken over by Arthur Bell & Sons in 1933 and has been a keystone malt for the Bell’s blend ever since. In 1985 Bell’s was bought by Guinness, with Blair Athol later becoming part of United Distillers and then Diageo in subsequent mergers. 

Blair Athol’s importance to Bell’s and other blends has resulted in limited official bottlings. Arthur Bell & Sons released Blair Athol as an 8-year-old and occasionally a 12-year-old from the late 1960s onwards; these were replaced in the late 1980s by a well-regarded sherried 12-year-old Flora & Fauna edition that has been the only ongoing bottling over the last few decades. Occasional one-off Blair Athols have been bottled for the Rare Malts, Manager’s Dram, Special Releases and the distillery’s Bicentenary. Independent Blair Athol is abundant.

North Star Spirits is an independent whisky bottling company founded in Glasgow in 2016 by AD Rattray alumnus Iain Croucher. North Star quickly established itself as one of the most popular of the recent wave of Scottish independent whisky bottlers thanks to a prolific series of top class whiskies released in eye-catching packaging at sensible prices. North Star Spirits was named Independent Bottler of the Year at the Scottish Whisky Awards in 2020 and 2021.

Besides their excellent single cask and small batch single malt releases, which are bottled without colouring or chill filtration and are usually at cask strength, North Star have also released several outstanding blended malt and blended Scotch whiskies alongside occasional bottlings of rum, gin, bourbon and Pedro Ximenez fortified wine.