Ben Nevis 1975 The Prestonfield 34 Year Old

Prior to founding Signatory Vintage, Andrew Symington was the Assistant Manager at Edinburgh's famous Prestonfield House Hotel. In his final years at the hotel, he had several sought after single malts bottled for them, proving to be the catalyst for establishing his own company in 1988. He later launched The Prestonfield Whisky Co as a secondary brand in order to capitalise on the renown of the hotel bottlings in the wider market. Like their Dun Eideann label, it also allowed them to grant exclusivity to different distributors. Many of these Prestonfield releases were bottled for La Maison du Whisky in Paris.

This Ben Nevis was distilled in 1975 and bottled from a single cask after 34 years. One of 146 bottles.

Ben Nevis distillery was built by "Long" John MacDonald in 1825, and was so popular by the end of the 19th century that at one point the estate employed over 200 people. After a series of closure and re-openings at the beginning of the 20th, it was eventually bought by former Canadian bootlegger, Joseph Hobbs. He installed a coffey still there in 1955, making Ben Nevis Scotland's first dual-operation distillery, and began to blend its malt and grain before filling it to cask. Sporadic closures again followed Hobb's death, with stability finally ensured in 1989 when it was bought by long-term customers, Nikka Whisky of Japan. Its turbulent history means there were few distillery bottlings until the launch of the 10 year old single malt in 1996, but casks had long been making their way to independent labels, and many of them are very highly praised.