Here at the distillery, we have been working hard to bring you some new and interesting events at this year’s Feis Ile Open Day.
We have arranged Masterclasses and tastings hosted by The Wills Family and the rest of the team, who will also be on hand to share their knowledge and experiences of working at Islay’s Farm Distillery.
Please read on to discover the full line up and other entertainment on offer this year.
We are very much looking forward to welcoming you to our distillery.
Kilchoman’s Feis Ile Open Day is Thursday 31st May 2018.
Monday 28th May
Founder’s Tour with Anthony Wills | 1pm
An in Depth tour of the distillery with Anthony, finishing in the warehouse where you can experience some of our early releases and individually selected cask samples.
£50
LAST PLACE REMAINING
Tuesday 29th May
Founder’s Tour with Anthony Wills | 1pm
An in depth tour of the distillery with Anthony, finishing in the warehouse where you can experience some of our early releases and individually selected cask samples.
£50
9 PLACES LEFT
Wednesday 30st May
Founder’s Tour with Anthony Wills | 1pm
An in depth distillery tour with Anthony, finishing in the warehouse where you can experience some of our early releases and individually selected cask samples.
£50
SOLD OUT
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday & Friday
Distillery Tours at 10am, and 3pm | £7pp
Intermediate Tour (Festival Week only) at 2pm | £15pp
Premium Tour at 11am | £35pp
Booking Advisable
Thursday 31st May | Kilchoman Open Day
Be a Bottler 9.30am
Join our bottling team and experience the time and care that goes in to every bottle of Kilchoman. Fill and label your own Machir Bay using our hands-on approach and get it signed by Robin Bignal, the Distillery Manager.
Includes your personalised 70cl bottle of Machir Bay
£50
SOME PLACES AVAILABLE
Be a Bottler 11am
Join our bottling team and experience the time and care that goes in to every bottle of Kilchoman. Fill and label your own Machir Bay using our hands-on approach and get it signed by Robin Bignal, the Distillery Manager.
Includes your personalised 70cl bottle of Machir Bay
£50
SOLD OUT
Islay’s Farm Tour 11am
General Manager Islay Heads will give you a guided tour of how the Distillery and the farm work in harmony. Ride along in the estate wagon stopping off at our water source for a dram of our 100% Islay and a lesson in peat cutting before continuing on to the dunes overlooking Machir Bay for a windswept nip of whisky of it’s namesake. As you make your way back to the distillery you’ll visit Kilchoman Church for a bit of sanctuary and a final pour of our Sanaig expression.
£35
SOLD OUT
Be a Bottler 12.30pm
Join our bottling team and experience the time and care that goes in to every bottle of Kilchoman. Fill and label your own bottle of Machir Bay using our hands-on approach and get it signed bu Robin Bignal, the Distillery Manager.
Includes your personalised 70cl bottle of Machir Bay
£50
SOLD OUT
The 100% Islay Philosophy with Anthony Wills 10am – 11.30am (Maltfloor/Malt Down/Seated)
Join distillery founder, Anthony Wills for an in-depth discussion on the 100% Islay range. This is his proudest creation and represents the revival of single malt produced on a single location from barley to bottle. Anthony will guide you through a selection of cask samples filled from 2008 to present day, hand picked from our warehouse.
£75
SELLING FAST-LIMITED AVAILABILITY
Be a Bottler 2pm
Join our bottling team and experience the time and care that goes in to every bottle of Kilchoman. Fill and label your own bottle of Machir Bay using our hands-on approach and get it signed by Robin Bignal, the Distillery Manager.
Includes your personalised 70cl bottle of Machir Bay
£50
SOLD OUT
Club Members’ Masterclass 2pm
Join George, James and Peter on a journey through some of their favoured expressions. Seated in our Warehouse, you will have the opportunity to sample some of kilchoman’s earliest and best releases chosen by each of the boys. Talk freely with them about working alongside their parents, Anthony and Kathy, at Kilchoman since the very beginning and listen to the many interesting and humorous stories they each have to tell.
£40
SOLD OUT
Islay’s Farm Tour 2pm
General Manager Islay Heads will give you a guided tour of how the Distillery and the farm work in harmony. Ride along in the estate wagon stopping off at our water source for a dram of our 100% Islay and a lesson in peat cutting before continuing on to the dunes overlooking Machir Bay for a windswept nip of whisky of it’s namesake. As you make your way back to the distillery you’ll visit Kilchoman Church for a bit of sanctuary and a final pour of our Sanaig expression.
£35
SOLD OUT
Premium Be a Bottler 3.30pm
Join our bottling team for a single cask bottling experience. This premium experience will enable you to bottle your very own distillery exclusive edition. From rolling the barrel in from our warehouse to hand writing the number on the label you will get to see first hand the time and care that goes in to creating one of our single cask releases.
Includes your 70cl bottle of Distillery Exclusive
£95
SOLD OUT
Still House Visits
Immerse yourself in the sweet smells of our New Make Spirit as it is being made in our still house. Chat informally with our friendly and knowledgeable stillmen whilst enjoying a dram of Machir Bay. These still house visits will be available regularly throughout the day and are free of charge.
(no pre-booking required)
12 places per visit
Warehouse Tastings
Join a member of our team in our warehouse for a range tasting straight from the cask. Samples will be taken from 3 different cask types individually selected by Robin Bignal, the Distillery Manager.
£20 (no pre-booking required)
12 places per visit
Tutored Range Tastings
Taste the range of Kilchoman releases including the Feis Ile 2017 bottling with a member of the Kilchoman team. You will be guided through each of your drams and given information on the background and future developments at Islay’s only farm distillery, producing single malt whisky from barley to bottle.
Available regularly throughout the day.
£10 (no booking required)
Malting & Peating (New Malt Floor) 12-4pm
Join our Brand Ambassador and Distillery Guide, Cherry, on our malt floor to discuss the Malting and Peating process in detail over a dram of 100% Islay. Cherry has completed the IBD course in Malting and has a great knowledge and passion for the science of germination.
Available from 12noon-4pm (no booking required)
12 places per visit
Live Music from 10.30am – 5pm (Old Malt Floor)
Trail West, Heron Valley, Reely Jiggered, Islay Pipe Band
Available throughout the day
Whisky Bar, Kilchoman Cocktails, Tastings, BBQ, Café and Gift Shop
All bookings must be made by calling +44(0)1496 850 011
All tickets are non-refundable.
Whilst we hope that you continue to enjoy our 2017 limited editions well into the festive period, we are delighted to say that we’ve saved something special for December. The 6th Edition Club Release will be available exclusively to Club Members from noon (GMT) on Wednesday the 6th of December.
This year’s club release is a cask strength (57.4%) vatting of five ten-year-old bourbon barrels, all distilled 01/11/2007, bottled 20/11/2017. The casks were individually selected by Kilchoman Founder Anthony Wills and represent his idea of the perfect Kilchoman 10-year-old.
“For me personally, Kilchoman is best when matured in fresh bourbon barrels, the lighter influence of the American oak makes for a more harmonious marriage between cask and spirit. This allows for Kilchoman’s natural floral citrus character to develop and integrate with that of the bourbon oak flavours”
These casks are like our crown jewels, we have few casks over ten years old so need to be very selective with when they are bottled. These being fresh barrels, are at their peak now, the balance is fantastic and they are some of the very best Kilchoman casks I’ve tasted’
The release of just 1241 bottles is exclusively available to Kilchoman Club members via the Kilchoman website, priced at £99.00 per bottle (70cl). Due to the number of bottles, members are limited to one bottle per person, sorry!
Set a reminder for Wednesday and once you have signed in you will see the Club Release image in your members homepage. Alternatively, sign in, click on ‘whisky shop’ then ‘club releases’.
Those who have purchased a Club release in the past will know that the volume of people on the website can cause a few issues and the page to be very slow at times. We have done what we can to make sure this is avoided but please be patient and once the initial traffic clears you will be able to freely navigate the website.
Whilst we wish we could ship the Club Release to all countries around the world, unfortunately we are limited to those detailed here.
Launching worldwide next week, the 2009 Vintage eight year old limited edition is our oldest globally-available release to date.
Though the casks selected for the 2009 Vintage were mostly distilled in 2009, a number of 2008 casks were also selected to add further layers of maturation.
The specific casks, chosen by Anthony Wills, Kilchoman Founder, are mostly a combination of fresh and refill bourbon barrels though Anthony also selected three 2008 Oloroso sherry butts to add additional layers of rich cooked fruits to balance with the lighter citrus and vanilla of the bourbon barrels. All previous Vintage expressions have been matured exclusively in bourbon barrels.
Nose: lemon, citrus and butterscotch notes are prominent with soft peaty aromas in the background.
Palate: soft sweetness first and peat smoke and ripe fruit notes following.
Finish: long, clean and sweet with peat smoke and soft fruits at the end.
Anthony Wills, Kilchoman Founder and Managing Director; “The evolution of Kilchoman single malt is well represented through our Vintage range. Now at eight years of maturation, the balance and depth of character coming through on both the nose and the palate is incredible. The oloroso sherry influence in the 2009 Vintage compared to the previous releases has given this whisky a different dimension with layered fruit and added sweet notes.”
The 2009 Vintage is bottled at 46% ABV and will be available worldwide from the 4th of September. Contact your local whisky shop to reserve a bottle, this one is not to be missed! A limited number of bottles will also be available from the Kilchoman website from midday (GMT) on Monday the 4th of September priced at £67.50. Limited to one bottle per person.
The guys from The Great Islay Swim dropped by the distillery yesterday for a chat and a few drams with Anthony. Chad and Justin, who both hail from New York, are attempting to swim around Islay, stopping at each distillery to collect a ration of whisky as they go. The 100 litre cask which will be filled by the time they finish their swim, will be bottled as The Pillage Blend and sold in aid of the RNLI. An epic challenge and a fantastic cause!
Find out more about their swim and The Pillage Blend here https://greatislayswim.com You can also follow Chad and Justin on social media – #greatislayswim
Over the last few months we have been making a few improvements at Kilchoman. One of the most major upgrades is the construction of our new Kiln and Malt Floor, this will allow us to double the capacity for malting our own barley by 50% taking us from 2 tonne batches to 3. There will also be the option to expand the Malt floor again if needs be. This purpose built building stands proudly opposite the Still House and overlooking our Barley fields.
The second improvement is to extend our current bottling hall, this now means that it will be a straight line and a far better height for the team to work. Every bottle of Kilchoman is bottled on site and our Single Casks are still hand labelled. At Kilchoman we are only one of two Distilleries on Islay who bottle their Single Malt on the Island.
The Wills brothers are off on another mission to spread the word of Kilchoman, this year their journey takes them up the west coast of the US. Starting in LA on September 4th, George and Peter will load up the Kilchoman Land Rover and head north. Travelling through California, Oregon and Washington the brothers will host sixteen official tastings (and countless unofficial tastings), concluding in Seattle on September 15th.
The1500-mile tour will be celebrated with an exclusive Cask Strength bottling of the distillery’s flagship expression, Machir Bay. The limited-edition release of just 840 bottles will be available exclusively during tasting events and from those stores visited as they wind their way north.
Have a look at the map in the link for more information on when and where you can catch the tour events
We are proud to support a number of local events and activities on Islay, from the Pipe Band to rowing, fishing and football. It was the turn of the annual Islay Beach Rugby tournament this weekend which we have sponsored for the past two years. It was a great event again with teams from all around Scotland making the trip over to Islay for some hard fought beach rugby. There was no holding back with plenty of big tackles and great rugby on display.
Kilchoman managed to go through the group undefeated and came up against Oban in the semi finals of the cup competition. This was a bruising game with a few seeing the sin bin but in the end Oban ran out 2-1 winners and made their way to the final to play Bruichladdich. The final was a close game but in the end Bruichladdich ran out deserved winners on the day and took home the cup.. And of course the main prize of a bottle of Kilchoman Sanaig!
We are delighted to announce that Loch Gorm has been awarded a Silver Medal, 2nd Best Islay Single Malt at this year’s International Whisky Competition. On the back of Machir Bay winning the gold medal last year, it is great to see Kilchoman being recognised in the top two again, this time for our sherry matured Loch Gorm release. I suppose you can’t win every year and we won’t tell you which distillery won gold this time around but it starts with an ‘A’ and ends with ‘Beg’. Congratulations to our southern Islay neighbours, we’ll see you at next years competition! Find out more about Loch Gorm HERE
We distill two Expressions of Kilchoman, one from barley grown and malted at the distillery, always referred to as 100% Islay, a second expression is produced from malted barley by Port Ellen malting. Our 100% Islay whiskies are unique, these limited editions are the only scotch single malt on the market created from barley both grown and malted on Islay. Our 100% Islay range is our reason for being and represents the revival of farm distilling once common place on Islay.
This year’s Feis Ile bottling is a vatting of two 100% Islay casks specifically selected by Anthony Wills, Kilchoman Founder and bottled at cask strength, 58% – Bourbon Barrel 324/2008 filled July 2008 and Oloroso Sherry Butt 443/2009 filled October 2009. Just 877 bottles at £90.00 will be available on our festival day on June 1st and only from the distillery – one bottle per person.
