Bunnahabhain 9 Years Old 2014 Cask #3841083 (Duncan Taylor)

Duncan Taylor's Octave range uses small ex-sherry casks of roughly 60-70 litres for short, intense finishing periods. The casks are made by splitting and recoopering a standard 500-litre sherry butt into eight smaller vessels, hence the Octave name. The format dramatically increases the wood-to-spirit ratio compared to a butt or hogshead, so even short finishing periods produce concentrated cask transfer. This 9 year old Bunnahabhain from cask 3841083 was distilled in 2014 and bottled in 2024 at 54.5% natural strength.

The Octave finish on a relatively young 9 year old Bunnahabhain produces a different effect from the same treatment on a 16 year old. Younger spirit hasn't yet developed the deeper integrated profile that mid-life maturation produces, so an Octave finish brings the sherry character forward against a more spirit-led base. The Oloroso-seasoned octave wood transfers walnut, fig and leather notes with the high concentration that the small cask format produces, layering them on top of the underlying distillate rather than merging into a single integrated profile.

On unpeated Bunnahabhain, the result is the spirit's natural oiliness and lightly maritime character carrying a more vivid sherry top note than longer-aged Octave releases would produce. The 54.5% bottling sits at full natural strength after the finish. Each Octave release runs to roughly 60-90 bottles given the small cask volume. Natural colour, non-chill-filtered, single cask.