Spring is almost upon us (or already upon us as far as I’m concerned) and you know what does it mean, right? Yes, time for the annual post of the Feis Ile Festival bottles.

This year, the festival will run from late May into June 2017 (26th May to 3rd June 2017) and unlike the previous two years, there will be no special celebrations this year, just a “normal” festival but still it will be a exciting festival.

This post will detail all the available information on the festival bottles and I’ll update it each time more details will be revealed.

If you look for the full festival information, go to the Festival site at islayfestival.com and you can find the full Islay Festival Distillery Programmes 2017 here when it will be published.

It’s a safe bet that just like previous years, we will have more Feis Ile bottlings from other independent bottlers and other sources – all will be updated in the post when the information will be released.

25/05/2017 Update: Bruichladdich bottle updated and added Loch Fyne Feis Ile Laphroaig
25/05/2017 Update: Lagavulin and Caol Ila bottles updated.
23/05/2017 Update #2:  Thanks to Pascal from www.heartofspirits.de we have further information on Bunnahabhain and Kilchoman bottles. They sounds nice!
23/05/2017 Update: Elements of Islay Ar9! I think we now know all about the independent bottles for Feis 2017 🙂

So here’s the list of Feis Ile 2017 bottlings and the available information:

Lagavulin – Open day on Saturday 27th May 2017

• Lagavulin 16 yo Moscatel Cask Wood double maturation (55.8%, £125, 6000 bottles)

Bruichladdich – Open day on Sunday 28th May 2017

• Port Charlotte Transparency (56.4% ,1000 bottles, £100)

Twelve casks of seven different types have been deployed by Head Distiller Adam Hannett in his crafting of this fascinating, limited edition.

All the spirit used was distilled using 100% Scottish barley and it was matured entirely on Islay. It has been bottled at the distillery at 56.4% alc. vol. using just a splash of Islay spring water. In common with all our whiskies, there has been no chill filtration employed and no artificial colouring has been added.

• Bruichladdich Valinches (2008 Bere Barley, 2006 Organic Barley, £75 each)

Caol Ila – Open day on Monday 29th May 2017

• Caol Ila 12 Year Old Amaroso Cask Wood double maturation (56.1%, £99, 1500 bottles)

Laphroaig – Open day on Tuesday 30th May 2017

• Laphroaig Cairdeas 2017 (Cask Strength Quarter Cask) – (57.2%, £77)

The Laphroaig Feis Ile 2017 offering is the Cairdeas 2017 which was fully matured in American Oak quarter casks (125 liter casks).

The Cairdeas QC Cask Strength edition will be available to purchase from Laphroaig e-shop here from Wednesday 7th June.

 

Bowmore – Open day on Wednesday 31st 2017

• Bowmore Feis Ile 2017 – Oloroso Sherry & Bordeaux Wine casks (£60.00, 2000 botles, max 4 bottles per person)

• Bowmore 26 Year Old Port cask (£350, 200 bottles)

• Fill You Own – 19 Year Old 1^st fill Oloroso Sherry Puncheon (£130, max 4 bottles per person)

Been maturing since the 13^th January 1998 fully matured in a 1^st fill Oloroso Sherry Puncheon for the 19 years.

Jura – Open day on Thursday 1st June 2017

• Jura Tastival 2017 (51% ,£85)

This cask strength, non-chill filtered limited edition expression marries some of our distillery’s finest aged spirits, enhanced in both first fill American White Oak ex-bourbon barrels and hand-picked Portuguese Graham’s Port Pipes.

Kilchoman – Open day on Thursday 1st June 2017

• 100% Islay (58%, £90, 877 bottles)

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.

Bunnahabhain – Open day on Friday 2nd June 2017

As usual, Bunnahabhain Feis Ile 2017 line up contains two bottles:

• Moine Port Pipe Finish 2004 13 Year Old (£95, 55.6%, 1596 bottles)

A complex release – A mix of Peated spirit matured for 10 years in Oloroso and Bourbon casks and then finished in port pipe for another 3 Years

• American Oak 1997 19 or 20 Year Old (£250, 52.2% ,528 bottles)

First 19 years in bourbon cask and then finished in virgin American oak

Ardbeg – Open day on Saturday 3rd May 2017

• Ardbeg Kelpie (46%, £98.00)

Ardbeg Feis Ile 2017 offering is the non cask strength version of Ardbeg Kelpie. The committee release is bottled at 51.7% but the general version for Ardbeg Day will be bottled at 46%. The Kelpie is matured in virgin casks of new oak from the Republic of Adygea (Adygea is a federal republic of Russia, near the Black sea).

Elements of Islay

• Elements of Islay Ar9 (51.6%, £150)

Yes, we have a new commemorative Feis Ile 2017 bottle and this time it’s Elements of Islay Ar9, Ardbeg in sherry cask!

Available from Elements of Islay (and Port Askaig) ‘Islay’ home during Islay Festival this year at Ramsay Hall in Port Ellen from Tuesday 30 May to Thursday 1 June.

Douglas Laing

• Big Peat Feis Ile 2017 Sherry Cask (48%, 1600 bottles, £49.99)

Big Peat Feis Ile 2017 is a marriage of Single Malts from Ardbeg, Bowmore, Caol Ila and Port Ellen Distilleries, bottled at 48% and proudly without colouring or chill-filtration. For the first time ever, this Small Batch bottling of Big Peat has been finished in Sherry Butts.

• Caol Ila 6 Year Old 2010 Fèis Ìle 2017 (50.6%, £51.68)

6 years old Caol Ila single cask (November 2010 to April 2017), bottled by Douglas Laing for their Provenance range, released for Fèis Ìle 2017 and available at Master of Malt

SMWS (Scotoch Malt Whisky Society)

Looks like SMWS are outdoing themselves this year with no less than three bottles to celebrate Feis, and of course all three bottles are from Islay distilleries. The bottles will be available, while stocks last, online at https://www.smws.com/ and at the Society’s UK venues from Thursday, 1 June. However, those attending the festival will have early access from Friday, 26 May.

• 10.113 The Crowd Pleaser (59%, Bunnahabhain, 10 Year Old, 186 bottles, £75)

• 3.299 Sweet Smoke on the Water (Bowmore, 20 Year Old, 54.2%, 252 bottles, £130)

• 29.211 Jazzy jousting hastlitude (Laphroaig, 21 Year Old, 51.6%, 228 bottles,£180)

It’s American oak Pedro Ximenez cask.

Nose brings minty humbug freshness and a deeper malt loaf note. The palate is sweet and rich, like dates wrapped in smoked bacon. A splash of water brings out floral notes, as well as some pineapple chunks in syrup.

Hunter Laing

• The Kinship series 
  1. Bunnahabhain 28 year old, Sherry cask (£310)
  2. Bowmore 30 year old, Sherry cask (£495)
  3. Caol Ila 33 year old, Sherry cask (£375)
  4. Laphroaig 30 year old, Bourbon hogshead (£720)
  5. Ardbeg 26 year old, Bourbon hogshead (£720)
  6. Port Ellen 34  year old, Sherr cask (£1800)

Hunter Laing will release a series of six bottles.  The release marks the start of construction of Ardnahoe Distillery. THE KINSHIP has been specially created to pay tribute to some of our neighbours on the famous Whisky Island. Each label represents a different aspect of the Scotch Whisky production process – Harvest, Malting, Fermentation, Distillation, Maturation and Bottling. The whiskies in the range have been hand selected by Jim McEwan as some of the finest Islay whiskies he has ever tasted, and his tasting notes for each are to be found on the back of each bottle. Each bottle comes presented in an individual jute bag.

Finlaggan

• Finlaggan Feis Ile 2017 (55%, 900 bottles)

An undisclosed Islay single malt with a Portwood Finish

Islay House Hotel

• Bruichladdich 1 Year Old Sauternes Cask (54.5%, £100)

Loch Fyne Whiskies

• First Editions Laphroaig 2006 (57.6%, 120 bottles, £175)

Distilled in 2006 at Laphroaig distillery, this Islay single malt spent 11 years maturing in a refill sherry butt before being bottled in 2017 by independent, family-run bottlers Hunter Laing & Co.