Bunnahabhain 1978-1991 - 12 Year Old - SMWS 10.9

Bunnahabhain was founded in 1881, the same year as the other traditionally unpeated Islay whisky, Bruichladdich. Bunnahabhain was owned by Highland Distillers for over a century; when Edrington took full control in 1999 the distillery was mothballed, and in 2003 Bunnahabhain was sold to Burn Stewart Distillers. Distell International bought Burn Stewart in 2013 after previous owners CL Financial went bust.

Highland Distillers bottled Bunnahabhain’s unpeated Islay malt whisky as a 12-year-old from the 1970s onwards. Burn Stewart added older expressions to the core range and now release many single casks and limited editions, some of which use peated Bunnahabhain, which has been produced since the late 1990s. In 2010 the bottling strength of Bunnahabhain’s whiskies was increased to 46.3% and colouring and chill filtration were discontinued; sales increased by 160% over the next ten years. Independent bottlings of both unpeated and peated Bunnahabhain are easy to find and generally high quality.

The Scotch Malt Whisky Society (SMWS) began in late 1970s Edinburgh when founder Pip Hills persuaded a group of friends to chip in for a cask of Glenfarclas, and was officially formalised in 1983. Today the SMWS has two venues in Edinburgh, a London bar and a string of international partnerships serving its 35,000 members. 

The Society’s whiskies are known for their unique SMWS coding system. Each cask bottled is assigned two numbers, representing the distillery and the bottling number, so 1.45 is the forty-fifth cask bottled from the first distillery and 33.27 is the 27th cask from the 33rd distillery.

Glenmorangie bought the Society in 2004, but sold it in 2015 to a private consortium who floated the SMWS on the stock market in 2021 via their holding company Artisanal Spirits Co.