Inverleven 1984-1996 - Gordon MacPhail

Inverleven was the name given to the single malt whisky made at the Dumbarton distillery complex built just west of Glasgow in 1938. While Dumbarton’s main operations centred on grain whisky production, Inverleven produced Lowland malt whisky for owner Hiram Walker’s blends, particularly Ballantine’s. Inverleven's two pot stills were joined in 1956 by Scotland’s first Lomond still, later reclassified as a separate distillery, Lomond.  

Dumbarton distillery fell on hard times in the 1980s, with the Lomond still being decommissioned in 1985 and the Inverleven pot stills falling silent in 1991. Bruichladdich bought Inverleven’s stills in 2005, later selling the pot stills to former owner Mark Reynier at Waterford distillery, but keeping the Lomond still to make their Botanist gin. At auction, the Deoch & Doras 1973 Inverlevens bottled by Chivas Bros and indie bottlings by the SMWS, G&M, Signatory and Cadenhead’s are well worth looking out for.

Founded in Elgin as a merchant grocer and wine and spirits wholesaler in 1895, Gordon & MacPhail are one of the oldest independent whisky bottlers in Scotland. Co-founder James Gordon owned shares in Longmorn, Strathisla and Glen Grant, and Gordon & MacPhail were soon bottling officially licensed single malts from several distilleries and sending empty casks from their wine business to be filled with new make spirit and returned for maturation in their Elgin warehouses.

Gordon & MacPhail pioneered high strength single malts at 100 proof (57%) in the 1950s, and in 1968 the company launched Connoisseurs Choice, one of the first integrated ranges of small batch independent whisky bottlings. After finally becoming distillers themselves with the purchase of Benromach in 1993, in 2010 Gordon & MacPhail bottled the first 70-year-old single malt whisky (a Mortlach 1938) and in 2020 the company released the first ever 80-year-old whisky: Glenlivet 1940.