SIGNATORY
When our spirits team locates a single barrel of single malt whisky to purchase, rarely do they buy the whisky directly from the distillery that made it. As you may know, the Scotch whisky business was built on the backs of blending houses like Johnnie Walker—companies who would purchase barrels from multiple distilleries and create their own consistently-tasting expressions from those selections. While blended whisky today has taken a back seat to single malt in terms of popularity, many of those blending houses still have incredible warehouses full of single casks—originally intended for a blend of some sort, but now much more desirable as individual commodities. Signatory—located at Edradour Distillery in Pitlochry—has been one of our closest partners over the past decade, allowing us to visit their warehouse each year and dig through their vast library of maturing stocks.
The warehouse is managed by Des McCagherty, with whom our spirits team meets each Spring upon their arrival. All of the casks purchased from Signatory each year are bottled without filtration, straight from the cask—meaning essential oils that can cloud the spirit when ice is added are left in, adhering to flavor over aesthetic beauty. With a reputation for top quality casks, our Signatory selections are almost always the most popular whiskies we import each year. As we purchase single casks directly on behalf of K&L, each selection we offer is extremely limited in quality, based on the volume of whisky left in the barrel.