Update 2: I have a review up and it’s damn good. read here.

Update: As the Embargo expired last night, more details regarding Lagavulin 8 Year Old are popping up: Indeed it will be bottled at 48% and it was matured primarily in ex-Bourbon casks. It will be available starting at the distillery in late March, European retailers in April and June in USA. Estimated price: £50/€60/$65.

In addition, No further special bottles were confirmed except for the annual Feis Ile, Jazz Festival and Special releases bottles, although they will increase bottles count for Feis Ile bottling this year… 😉

Although we’re only in February, a special event in London was held earlier this month to mark the start of the 200th anniversary celebrations of Lagavulin Distillery. From what was revealed on the internet, they had a taste of a new, special but non Feis Ile bottling which was told to be very good, but no further details were revealed till now due to embargo.

However, a new Lagavulin label was revealed on the American Federal TTB site – a 8 Year Old Lagavulin, presumably bottled at 48%:

It’s an interesting choice to release a less than 10 Year Old bottling, which means Diageo and Lagavulin are confident this young Lagavulin is good enough for such a high profile release (as evident by the Alfred Barnard quote on the label.

And of course, there’s the numerical connection to the existing bottlings, with 8 being half age the normal 16 Year old, But don’t hold your breath and don’t hold any hopes for it to cost half price…

It will be an exciting year in Lagavulin this year!

Information source: ttbonline.gov