How record prices for a rare Scotch whisky sparked a ‘liquid gold’ rush

Port Ellen distillery is situated along a sweeping bay on the Scottish island of Islay. It is a place of sea salt and moss, wet rocks and moving clouds.

Whisky has been made in this part of the world, from its clear streams, peat bogs and soft sea air, for centuries. But whisky making here is about to get a very 21st-century revision: Port Ellen’s new distillery will build cutting-edge experimentation right into its heart.

“I am visualising the new distillery as a cathedral to distilling,” Georgie Crawford, Port Ellen’s master distiller, says.

“It’ll be clean lines and everything in its right place. At our Lagavulin distillery, just next door, everything developed and changed over the years, and there are all sorts of pipes all over the place, but at Port Ellen we can design it new and perfect.”

Not that “new” will sweep aside the distillery’s long history: Port Ellen was established in 1825. It then closed in the 1930s, and was rebuilt in 1967, only to close again in 1983.

It was only much later, after long years in old wooden casks, that anyone knew quite how outstanding the whisky produced in those 16 short years before its second closure would be.

Released in strictly limited bottlings, Port Ellen single malt Scotch whisky soon earned cult status with whisky aficionados, who were only too aware that stocks from this revered “ghost distillery” were finite.

The oldest ever bottling of Port Ellen, a delectable 39-year-old that sells for £4,500 (US$5,714) a bottle, has just been released by owners, drinks giant Diageo.