A rare bottle of The Macallan 60 Years Old single Highland malt Scotch whisky sold for £20, 150*, the highest ever price paid for a single bottle of whisky, at an auction held at McTear's in Glasgow on Wednesday 17th April 2002. (*including VAT and buyer's premium)

The Blake Label | Detail

The Adami Label | Detail

The bottle was sold unlabelled to an anonymous collector and the lot price included the opportunity for the purchaser to design their own bespoke label. The whisky was originally filled into cask in 1926 at The Macallan distillery at Craigellachie, Speyside, and bottled at cask strength of 42.6% vol in 1986. It is one of only 40 bottles of The Macallan 60 Years Old and only the 26th bottle to be released for sale.

This is only the second time that an unlabelled bottle has been made available for sale: a bid of £15,000 was made when the first unlabelled bottle was auctioned in September 2001. The first 12 bottles were released in 1986 and featured a label designed by Sir Peter Blake, who designed the famous cover for the Beatles' album, "Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band". The second 12 bottles, released in 1993, featured a label designed by the Italian artist, Valerio Adami.

We are happy to offer future purchasers of the few remaining bottles of 1926 Macallan the opportunity to work with a designer to create their own bespoke label design.
THE MACALLAN DISTILLERS LTD.

1926 I Gertrude Ederle became the first person to swim the treacherous twenty-two-mile English Channel, taking fourteen hours and thirty-one
minutes. The first telephone calls were made between London and New York. 
Rudolph Valentino's last film 'The Son of The Sheik' was showing at cinemas. Clara Bow became the first ever "It Girl" and the Charleston was all the rage.

1937 I During 1937 there were a few major technological breakthroughs. Charlie Chaplin's first 'talkie' movie, "Modern Times," was released. Amelia Earhart, the first woman to fly across the Atlantic and the first person to fly
solo from Hawaii to California, was presumed killed when her aircraft disappeared mysteriously over the Pacific. 

1938 I In the radio broadcast of the `War of the Worlds', Orson Welles created panic in America with a fear that Martians were actually invading Earth. Despite disclaimers that clearly identified it as a dramatisation (including several announcements), 'The War of the Worlds' broadcast, which resembled a series of news bulletins, was mistaken for actual news flashes.

1939 I Frank Sinatra did it his way and made his recording debut in this year. Nylon stockings first went on sale in the state of Delaware, and the perennial 
love story `Gone with the Wind' premiered. With help from University of
Chicago physicist Arthur Compton, General Electric invented fluorescent lighting, a new, efficient form of illumination.

Written by Brian Henningan

The text is an excerpt from "The Definitive Guide to Buying Vintage Macallan" (pp. 35 - 41), First Edition, published 2003 by Macallan Distillery Ltd.