North British 1962-2013 - 50 Year Old - Douglas Laing - Directors Cut - Single Cask 9783

North British is a Lowland grain whisky distillery owned jointly by Diageo and Edrington and has a production capacity of around 70 million litres of alcohol per annum. The distillery was founded on the outskirts of Edinburgh in 1855 by blenders William Sanderson, James Crabbie and Andrew Usher with the goal of easing their reliance on the grain whisky cartel Distillers Company Limited.

North British remained independent for over a century before being taken over in 1993 by Edrington Group and, ironically, International Distillers and Vintners - the descendant of North British’s original rival Distillers Company Limited. Today North British also makes Smirnoff vodka, while the distillery’s easy-drinking single grain whisky has recently become widely available from independent whisky bottlers including Signatory, Douglas Laing and Hunter Laing.

Founded in the late 1940s by Fred Douglas Laing Sr, the Douglas Laing company spent decades as whisky blenders and exporters before Fred Laing’s sons Stewart and Fred Jr introduced the highly influential Old Malt Cask single malt range in 1998. The McGibbon’s Provenance and Old & Rare Platinum series followed soon afterwards, establishing Douglas Laing as one of Scotland’s finest independent bottlers.

In 2013 Stewart Laing left the business, taking Old Malt Cask and Old & Rare to his new company Hunter Laing, while Fred Laing Jr was joined by his daughter Cara and her husband Chris Leggatt from Morrison Bowmore, who left the business in 2023. The Old Particular and Extra Old Particular ranges were introduced to replace Old Malt Cask and Old & Rare, and the company has since moved into distilling with the purchase of Strathearn distillery in 2019 and the construction of Clutha distillery in Glasgow.