Dailuaine 14 Year Old - Cadenheads - Duthies

Founded in 1852 and expanded to its current six stills as early as 1960, Dailuaine is a large but relatively obscure Speyside distillery, one of many in owner Diageo’s portfolio, which it joined in 1925. Dailuaine bears the proud distinction of being the first distillery in Scotland to have had Charles Cree Doig’s famous pagoda roof on its kilns, although sadly this historic structure was destroyed by fire in 1917.

Dailuaine can make over 5m litres of spirit per annum, but the importance of its whisky to Diageo’s blends means that its official bottling history is rather scanty. Dailuaine 16-year-old Flora & Fauna was introduced in 1991 and was followed by a Rare Malts Edition and a superb Flora & Fauna Cask Strength bottling in 1996-7, before Dailuaine finally got its own Diageo Special Release in 2015. Thankfully, independent Dailuaines first appeared around the end of the 1970s and are now abundant.

In 1842 George Duncan established a wine merchant and distillery agency business in Aberdeen. Duncan was joined in the early 1850s by his brother-in-law William Cadenhead, who took over the business after Duncan’s death in 1858, changing the company’s name to Wm. Cadenhead. When Cadenhead died in 1904 the company passed to his nephew Robert Duthie, who developed the spirits side of the business.

Duthie died suddenly in 1931, and employee Ann Oliver was put in charge of Cadenhead’s. Sadly, Oliver’s tenure ended in financial difficulty and on her retirement in 1972 the business was forced to sell its entire inventory. Cadenhead’s was acquired soon afterwards by J & A Mitchell, proprietors of Springbank distillery, who relocated the business to Campbeltown. Cadenhead’s has flourished under Mitchell’s stewardship, releasing many legendary single malt bottlings in the 1980s and 1990s and now has outlets in Edinburgh and London as well as Campbeltown.