Glenturret Distillery

The exact origin of Glenturret is debatable. It’s known that an illicit distillery by the name of Hosh was operating at this site by 1775, but some sources claim that distillation was taking place there much earlier in the 18th century. The official founding of the distillery was in 1818, under John Drummond, at Crieff in the Southern Highlands.

The name Glenturret was adopted in 1875 under the management of Thomas Stewart. It was actually taken from a nearby distillery which had gone by that name before failing in 1852.

Prohibition and war shortages hit the distillery hard in the 1920s under the ownership of Mitchell Bros Ltd, who took over in 1903. Production came to a halt in 1921, and after that it was only used for storing the remaining stock of whisky. This was depleted by 1927, and Mitchell Bros went under two years later. When they did, the distillery was dismantled altogether. The equipment was flogged and the buildings converted to agricultural storage.

Glenturret stayed shut for three decades after this, only reopening in 1957 under James Fairlie. He rebuilt the distillery and outfitted it with equipment from Tullibardine distillery, which was being refurbished at the time.

Production resumed two years later and Fairlie ran the distillery for more than two decades until it was bought by Remy-Cointreau. After nine years it was purchased by Highland Distillers before they were taken over by Edrington in 1999.

The current owners are Swiss, with Glenturret jointly owned by the luxury goods company Lalique and billionaire Hansjörg Wyss who took over in 2019.

The distillery has a mash tun which only holds 1.05 tons, and is the only hand stirred tun remaining in Scotland. It is equipped with eight Douglas Fir washbacks and a single pair of stills. Water for the distillery is drawn from Loch Turret just over 3km away. It has an upper production capacity of 340,000 litres of spirits a year, however that is expected to reach half a million litres within a few years.

The current core lineup at Glenturret consists of the 10 year old, as well as the Sherry Cask Edition, Triple Wood Edition, and the Peated Edition. These three expressions were all released without an age statement. The 10 year old has been described as an aperitif whisky, with a light nose of orange, vanilla and malt. Some spice from the sherry cask maturation comes through on the tongue with notes of ginger and cinnamon. This is joined by more sweet fruit flavours and some oak before a medium finish. The Peated Edition combines the distillery’s unpeated spirits with its heavily peated Ruadh Mor for an intoxicating mix of smoke, spice, and sweetness.

Recent Limited Releases include a 15 year old and 30 year old for those seeking a more mature whisky. New releases to the core range are also expected to come out of Glenturret in 2020.