Arran 9 Years Old 2014 (Old Particular)

Old Particular is positioned by Douglas Laing as their aged single cask range, typically drawing on stock of fourteen years and older. Younger releases like this 9 Year Old appear when individual casks show standout character at a younger age, justifying single cask presentation outside the more youth focused Provenance line. The 2014 distillation year falls within the period when Arran was approaching its peak production capacity at Lochranza, ahead of the 2019 opening of Lagg distillery for peated production.

Maturation ran nine years at Lochranza in a single cask before transfer to Douglas Laing for bottling. The cask wood type is consistent with the Old Particular template, typically refill American oak hogsheads selected for the standalone profile required for single cask presentation. Bottled at 48.4% without chill filtration and without added colour.

At nine years old the cask underlay sits forward of the deeper extraction characteristic of older Old Particular releases. The Arran new make signature of citric, vanilla, fresh fruit and stone fruit esters remains very visible, with the Bourbon cask contributing vanillin and the initial layer of whisky lactone extraction rather than the full integration of longer maturations. The 48.4% bottling strength holds the lipid fraction intact for the textural depth that the spirit carries.