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Adelphi Selection (Whisky)

Adelphi Selection is an independent distiller and bottler, based in Argyllshire and Fife, in the Highlands of Scotland. The Adelphi company traces its origins back to 1825 and the establishment of Adelphi Distillery in the Gorbals district of Glasgow. Adelphi was founded by brothers Charles and David Gray, who changed its name to Loch Katrine Adelphi after a vast pipeline was created to carry water from Loch Katrine to the city of Glasgow. A decade later ownership of the operation passed to A Walker & Co, who owned large distilleries in Liverpool and the Irish city of Limerick. It was bought by DCL (Distillers Company Limited) in 1903 and its pot stills stopped four years later because of the “Great Gorbals Disaster”. One of the colossal washbacks in the distillery collapsed, engulfing the neighbouring street in a tidal wave of hot alcohol and resulting in fatality; one man drowned and many others were lucky to escape. The Adelphi Distillery Ltd name was revived in 1993 by Jamie Walker, the great-grandson of former distillery owner Archibald Walker. He operated Adelphi as an exclusive independent bottling operation before selling it to Keith Falconer and Donald Houston in 2004.

The company specialises in Single Cask bottlings, which are offered without chill-filtration or the addition of colour. Some 50 casks are bottled each year, and the ‘Fascadale’ name recurs on small-batch bottlings from unspecified island distilleries at a variety of ages. Adelphi is also now a distiller as well as a bottler, with its Ardnamurchan Distillery, opened in 2014.

Adelphi uses the drawing of the ‘Dancey Man’ on its bottles. It is a mid-19th century cartoon, depicting Sir William Gladstone performing an energetic 'Pas de Bas' over an ear of barley to celebrate the passing of a new law that revenue could only be raised on the amount of whisky left in each cask after maturation, and not the level that it was originally filled to.