The Balvenie 1931 Collection arrives with almost a century of history. At its centre is an 88-Year-Old Single Malt, the oldest whisky The Balvenie has ever released. Distilled on 5 March 1931 and filled into European oak sherry butt cask #239 from Jerez, it remained in the Dufftown warehouses until Malt Master Kelsey McKechnie judged it ready in 2019. Just 17 bottles exist.
The date is more than a convenient piece of mythology. In 1931, amid a deeply difficult period for Scotch, The Balvenie opened the Home Malt Floor that still underpins one of the distillery’s defining practices. McKechnie describes the 88-Year-Old in terms of honey, mint leaf, buttery fudge, heather, bracken, leather and aromatic oak, with a long, drying finish. No one needs an 88-year-old whisky, of course; that is precisely the point. This is as much an artefact of patience as a drink.
Daniel Arsham is therefore an unusually intelligent collaborator. The New York artist has built much of his career around “fictional archaeology”, turning contemporary objects into relics that appear excavated from an imagined future. His recent London exhibition, Time Fold, revisited nearly two decades of work concerned with geology, archaeology and cultural residue.
Left: Daniel Arsham in The Balvenie archives, examining historic photographs and distillery records as part of his research for The 1931 Collection.
Right: The Balvenie distillery team in 1931, a defining year in the whisky house’s history and the year its Home Malt Floor opened.
For The Balvenie, he has created a presentation piece formed from eight hand-patinated bronze layers, one for each decade, with 88 layers of oak on the reverse and a copper disc cut from a decommissioned Balvenie still at its centre. It makes the passage of time physical without feeling like decoration for decoration’s sake.
The collection is wisely not confined to the near-unobtainable 88. A 12-Year-Old, made with 100 percent home-malted barley, and a 15-Year-Old, using 100 percent home-grown and home-malted barley, are both matured in American oak before finishing in ex-sherry European oak butts from Jerez. That finishing method has particular resonance here: former Malt Master David C. Stewart pioneered cask finishing at The Balvenie in 1982.
The Balvenie 1931 Collection 15-Year-Old and 12-Year-Old, both finished in ex-Sherry Bodega European oak butts from Jerez and created in the spirit of the extraordinary 88-Year-Old release.
The 1931 Collection makes its global debut during Frieze Seoul, 2–5 September, with an Arsham-directed performance. The 88-Year-Old is reserved for private clients and collectors; the 15-Year-Old launches through global travel retail, while the 12-Year-Old will appear in selected markets. This a luxury collaboration built around “time” that actually earns the word.
Author: Lina Ress
Discover more of Daniel Arsham’s fascination with time in our features on his watch collaborations: Hublot Arsham Droplet and Hublot MP-17 Arsham Splash.
Show Comments +