Luxury Brands - Glenfiddich

Glenfiddich is one of a few Distilleries still family owned to this day. For 20 years William Grant had a dream to create the ‘best dram in the valley’ and with the help of his family he was able to achieve that dream.

In the summer of 1886, William with his nine children by his side began filling his lifelong dream. Together they began building his distillery by hand with the help of one stone mason. After a whole year of working tirelessly it was ready and on Christmas day 1887 the first drop of spirit fell from the copper stills. William named the distillery Glenfiddich which means Valley of the Deer in Gaelic.

Deep into Prohibition in 1923, Williams' grandson Grant Gordon joins the family business and surprises the industry by increasing whisky production. At the end of the Prohibition, Glenfiddich was one of only six distilleries still operating in Scotland and with Grant's help they were ready to meet the new surge in demand for fine, aged whiskies.

In 1957 William’s great grandson Charles Gordon joined and insisted on having coppersmiths onsite at the distillery as they are rare and skilled craftsmen who are always on hand to build and tend to the copper stills. 

In 1961 influential 20th century designed Hans Schleger created a triangular bottle which was inspired by the trinity of ingredients (water, air and malted barley) which expertly crafted creates Glenfiddich whisky.

The great grandson of William, Sandy Grant Gordon, is so amazed with Glenfiddich he believed it should be shared with the world so he made it his duty to promote it around the world, who up until this point were only used to drinking blended whisky

To celebrate 100 years Glenfiddich released one of the most collectable and rare whiskies. The first ever vatting of their 50 year old which has been married to perfection from nine casks laid down in the 1930s this was to commemorate their founder and his dream to create ‘the best dram in the valley’

In 1998 Glenfiddich continued to invent new ways to challenge your palate. Their fifth malt master created the Solera vat. This was a pioneering process used to craft their 15 years old which to this day continues to get awards for its complex and intense flavours.

In 2001 Glenfiddich released the oldest single malt whisky. All the way back in 1937 cask 843 was filled and was held for 64 years. Along the way, ten consecutive warehouse masters had watched over it until it felt right to bottle, 61 bottles were produced.

In 2010 extreme snowfall damaged the warehouse roofs causing a collapse and exposed maturing casks to the winter sky. The warehousemen worked around the clock in -19 degrees temperature to save every cask. As a tribute to those hard workers, the Malt master created Snow Phoenix. He married the finest of the rescued casks to create a limited edition single malt.

Glenfiddich was originally just a dream and has now become one of the biggest whisky distillers in the world! William's passion and pioneering spirit is still seen throughout the process and because of this Glenfiddich is now the world's most awarded single malt scotch whisky which is an incredible achievement which I’m sure William would be proud of.

Click here to view the luxury brand Glenfiddich

Written by Oliver Partington