The Macallan’s Harmony Collection has been the brand’s way acknowledging that, for a certain kind of buyer, the whisky is only half the purchase. The other half is the object and the story around it: the way the release looks on a shelf, and how to wear a convincing sustainability narrative – all of these are small cues that separate “limited” from genuinely coveted.

Tracking The Macallan’s previous limited releases, you can see how Harmony fits into a wider industry pattern: big houses using collaborations and a strong materials story to make non age-statement bottles feel special and specific. The earlier Harmony chapters leaned strongly into that, moving first from chocolate to coffee, then to a nature-led collaboration with Stella and Mary McCartney, and then an oak-focused release tied to the distillery’s 200th anniversary work with Cirque du Soleil.

That sequence matters because it sets expectations: Harmony is not trying to be a quiet “core range” bottling. It wants to be a coveted themed experience, even as the single malt whisky itself has to be made the authentic way, without flavourings or literal tea or coffee added in.

For its fifth edition, Harmony pivots into high-end Chinese tea, and specifically into a collaboration with JING, a brand that positions itself around single origin and single garden sourcing. The collaboration is presented as two whiskies with a reference tea each: Phoenix Honey Orchid Tea on one side, Organic Cherrywood Lapsang Tea on the other. The idea is that they are meant to sit at opposite ends of the flavour and colour spectrum, mirroring the diversity of the JING teas that inspired them and nudging at the usual assumptions about what “tea-like” could even mean in whisky.

If you’ve never gone down the JING rabbit hole, their range is broad in a way that feels like it’s trying to map tea as a category rather than push one “house style”. They sell single-origin loose leaf tea across breakfast teas, green teas, oolong teas, matcha, herbal and caffeine-free options, plus black, jasmine, organic, white, yellow, puerh, and seasonal spring teas. They also split out tea bags as their own lane, with breakfast, green, caffeine-free, black, and herbal options, and they have the supporting ecosystem that premium tea brands tend to build: teaware, brewing accessories, matcha kit items, refill caddies, and gift sets.

It speaks to people who already think in terms of origin, cultivar, processing, and brewing variables, in the same way whisky people think about oak type, seasoning regime, fill level, and maturation conditions.

Phoenix Honey Orchid, the tea that anchors this particular expression, is positioned by JING as an oolong with a heady, floral, peach-leaning profile, and it is tied to a specific garden and origin story. The companion tea, Cherrywood Lapsang, sits in a completely different zone flavour-wise: it’s a lapsang souchong-style black tea built around smoke, with JING describing it as rich Yunnan black tea gently smoked over cherrywood in the UK.

We recently had a chance to taste the Inspired By Phoenix Honey Orchid Tea at The Macallan House in Singapore. The liquid itself is said to be matured predominantly in sherry-seasoned American oak casks, supported by sherry-seasoned European oak, plus a subtle inclusion of ex-bourbon American oak casks. So even before you get to any “tea” discussion, the cask recipe is already pointing towards something lighter, clearer, and more aromatic than you might assume from a Macallan built purely on European oak sherry casks.

And that’s probably the most useful way to approach this release if you want to stay honest about it. Rather than asking whether it tastes exactly like Phoenix Honey Orchid tea, it makes more sense to ask what happens when Macallan deliberately softens the oak footprint and lets the distillate speak more. If the tea inspiration is doing its job, it should probably show up as a nudge towards subtlety and clarity, not as some literal “brewed tea” note pasted on top.

Whisky Review: The Macallan Harmony Collection, Inspired By Phoenix Honey Orchid Tea , In Collaboration With JING Tea, 43.9% ABV

Tasting Notes

Colour: Light russet.

Nose: Rounded and immediately familiar, with Macallan’s soft, enveloping richness of honeyed European oak joined with a cooling, gently perfumed lift that feels almost refreshing, shaped by heavily iced jasmine oolong tea. It’s got a restrained sherry oak character, giving a subtle sweetness and dry fruit depth rather than weight–red currants and raspberries, followed by the darker chew of dried dates and dry apricots. Some bright zest of orange peel. As it settles, the whisky turns more malt-focused, with a dry, crumbly impression from McVities’ digestive biscuits and refined cereal grain with a slightly chalky, powder-fine texture. Gentle warmth builds slowly at the edges from nutmeg and cassia, rounding out the nose without pushing it into overt spice.

Palate: Smooth and rounded entry with calm, cohesive mid-palate. Opens with a slightly viscous mouthfeel that spreads evenly rather than hitting hard. A spiced lift coming from ginger and clove recalls chai milk tea. Warmth is cushioned by soft vanilla and polished oak. The flavours unfold gradually, with clean honeyed sweetness continuing from the nose, followed by a restrained citrus tension from dry orange zest and yuzu zest. The oak presence is clearly there, but it stays very restrained, allowing more of Macallan’s biscuity malt character to come through. Overall, the palate feels mild and measured, favouring balance and clarity over intensity. Nothing pushes aggressively.

Finish: Clean and relatively short, tapering off gently. A final wave of baking spice led by soft pepper, aromatic clove and cassia, giving a dry warmth as the sweetness recedes. Toward the end, there is a subtle bitterness shaped by light cocoa powder and a faint espresso note that briefly recalls the previous Rich Cacao and Intense Arabica -inspired expressions. Fades quickly into a lightly syrupy, woody-herbal aftertaste that brings to mind Angostura.

My Thoughts:

This is a very pleasant, easy-going whisky that leans into The Macallan’s classic richness and roundness but expresses it in a subtler register. The sweet European oak influence – the distillery’s house style – is clearly present, yet it is deliberately restrained, which I find to allow the natural sweetness and biscuity depth of the malt to show through more clearly. It goes without saying that the tea inspiration comes through in the approach and suggestion of having a gentler aromatics rather than a literal tea flavour, with a spirit that focuses on precise freshness and lightness instead of drama. You get a well-integrated glass of oak, spice, dried fruit and malt which highlights the inherent quality of the spirit itself without relying on intensity to make its point.

@CharsiuCharlie