Arran 10 Years Old

This 2022 bottling of Arran 10 Years Old represents the core expression of the distillery in the years immediately preceding the autumn 2019 rebrand. By 2022 the distillery had been in production for 22 years and James MacTaggart had been Master Distiller since 2007, with the 10 Years Old well established as the entry point to the Arran range. The 2022 packaging retained the pre rebrand visual identity that the autumn 2019 refresh would replace.

Production at Lochranza follows the same template across decades: soft water from Loch na Davie, around 55 hour fermentation in stainless steel washbacks, distillation in tall onion shaped pot stills designed for high reflux and clean fruity spirit recovery. The 10 Years Old is built from a combination of first fill ex Bourbon barrels and sherry casks, with the ratio adjusted across batches to maintain a consistent house profile. Bottled at 46%, non chill filtered, no added colour.

The cask combination delivers the structural balance the 10 Years Old has always been built on: the Bourbon component provides vanillin, cis whisky lactones and the toasted sugar layer from American oak hemicellulose breakdown, while the sherry portion contributes furfural, syringaldehyde and a softer dried fruit edge. At 46% with no chill filtration, the long chain fatty acid esters are retained in solution, giving the wider creamy texture. Flavour profile: citric, vanilla, fresh fruit, honey, new wood, chocolate.