This current season at Sotheby’s has seen some exceptional results for our sales of whisky and spirits, so we wanted to provide you with a brief overview and also a look at the sales happening this July.
In June in New York, we sold a bottle of The Yamazaki 55 for $600,000, against an estimate of $400,000-500,000, and two ultra-rare casks of whisky from the fabled Brora and Port Ellen distilleries for a combined total of £1.75 million ($2.1 million).
The month of May saw our largest ever spirits offering with a sale of over 1,000 bottles of Scotch whisky, which achieved a total of $2.5 million (est. $1.5-2.1m) with 95% of lots sold. Two days later, our first dedicated Moutai auction in London, consigned from the descendants of a Chinese restaurant owner in Brazil, brought £1 million.
We have three more sales to go until the close of the summer season, two out of Hong Kong, and one out of New York.
Distilled | Whisky is a 247-lot sale celebrating the finest and rarest Scotch, Japanese whisky and Moutai, led by the highly precious and collectible Macallan Tales of The Macallan Volume I 71 Year Old (est. HK$750,000-1,000,000), followed by the iconic Macallan Red Collection 78 Year Old (est. HK$700,000-1,000,000). A selection of rare Japanese whiskies from renowned distilleries features the highly sought-after Hanyu Ichiro’s Malt Card Series (a great opportunity for collectors looking to complete a full set of the series), Karuizawa 31 Year Old #4961 Shinanoya Private Cask 5th Anniversary 1981, and Hibiki 35 Year Old Arita Ceramic Collection.
On the same day at 2pm HKT, we will present a dedicated single-lot sale of The Dalmore Constellation Collection (est. HK$3,500,000-5,000,000) – the full 21 bottle set of vintages spanning 1964 all the way through to 1992, first released in 2012, which has never been seen at auction in its entirety until now. Bottled at cask strength and natural colour, this was the first time the Dalmore created a vintage series such as this.
Last, but not least, on 29 July in New York, Whisky & Whiskey | The Three Continents Collection Part V – The Final Chapter. This sale sees the finale of the biggest whisky collection Sotheby’s has sold from a single owner featuring over 3,000 bottles of rare whisky. The auction is supported by various other collections including a Yamazaki 55 Year Old, and three 50 Year Old Black Bowmores including vintages from 1961, 1964 and 1966.
That will bring the total number of spirits sale held so far this year to 12 – with plenty more upcoming in the calendar.
Looking ahead, on 23 September in New York, Sotheby’s will auction The Timeless Whisky Collection. This is a single owner sale of nearly 600 bottles estimated to achieve $2million. The sale is led by The Macallan in Lalique Six Pillars Collection that is offered alongside an experience donated by Lalique themselves as well as personalised glassware and a bespoke display platform hand crafted from Highland Scottish Burr Elm by Anselm Fraser Design on which the bottles can be lovingly showcased by the lucky bidder.