Ardbeg is a distillery on the south-east coast of Islay, where John MacDougall took out a licence in 1815.1,2,3 Historic Environment Scotland counts its core among the five oldest surviving distilleries in Scotland.2,4 It made little whisky from 1981 to 1997, until The Glenmorangie Company bought it and brought it back.1,2,5LVMH has owned it through The Glenmorangie Company since 2004.2,6,7
Very good review score, 88 out of 100Very good88/100
Fresh, precise and resinous, this Ardbeg balances tarry peat with oysters, seaweed and lemons, finishing refreshingly with salted mint and aniseed.
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By Serge Valentin
Producing, 1815–1981
Silent, 1981–1989
Producing, 1989–1996
Silent, 1996–1997
Producing, 1997–today
1815185019001950Today
Smugglers and the MacDougalls
A distillery at Ardbeg was mentioned in 1794, when its owner, Alexander Stewart, was sequestrated.3 Records show spirit being made illegally here from 1798.2,6,8 A Glasgow whisky merchant backed John MacDougall's licensed venture, on a spot long known to smugglers.1,2,3 In 1835 output was recorded at up to 500 gallons (2273 litres) a week.2,9 In 1838 Glasgow spirit merchant Thomas Buchanan bought the distillery, while John MacDougall's son Alexander kept running it.1,8,10 After Alexander died in 1853, Colin Hay and Alexander's sisters, Margaret and Flora, ran it together.1,2,10 The sisters may have been Scotland's first female distillers, and the Hay family stayed involved until the 1920s.1,2,10 In 1855 John Ramsay became the landlord and gave the distillers long leases and secure water rights.2,8
By 1887 Ardbeg made 250,000 gallons (1.1 million litres) of whisky a year, the most on Islay, and employed 60 people.1,2,8 Merchants in Glasgow, Liverpool and London took all of it.1,2,8 Alfred Barnard found two pot stills, eight washbacks, which are fermenting vessels, and malt kilns that burned only peat.9 A map surveyed in 1897 shows massive warehouses on the old gardens, a second malt barn, and new cottages, a post office and an excise house.2
Sources disagree: the date. This page uses 1887.
1887: Ardbeg Distillery, Historic Environment Scotland, The Gazetteer for Scotland1,2,8
New owners and the Depression
In 1922 Alexander MacDougall & Co Ltd bought Ardbeg outright for £19,000.1,8 The distillery was closed during the Depression, from 1932 to 1935.2,8 In 1959 Distillers Company Limited (DCL) and Canada's Hiram Walker bought minority stakes.10
Hamish Scott and Hiram Walker
Hamish Scott arrived as manager in September 1964 and set out to modernise how Ardbeg made whisky.6,11 He first cut the time to germinate barley in the maltings to about five days, and by his account he switched to distillers' yeast only.6,11 In 1964 the spirit still's worm tub was replaced with a condenser, which turns vapour back into spirit; the wash still's went four years earlier.11 In 1966 the stills moved from direct coal firing to steam heating, which gave more control and less risk of scalding.11 Scott became general manager in 1971 and was told to raise output for the blending companies.11 Peating levels fell sharply in 1973-74, which Scott blamed on bad weather that kept the machinery from working.
Next: Hamish Scott and Hiram Walker, Mostly silent, Glenmorangie brings it back, Since 2018, How it makes its spirit
The malting floors were used for what was thought to be the last time in 1980.2 On 25 March 1981 the distillery closed with the loss of 18 jobs.1,2,10 In 1987 Allied Lyons bought Hiram Walker, and with it Ardbeg.1,8,10 Part-time distilling restarted in 1989 to supply blenders, with some experiments, such as unpeated Kildalton spirit.1,2,10 After 1989, when Allied owned both, Laphroaig took spare parts from Ardbeg.12,13 It shut down again in 1996, keeping on only Ruari Macintyre and a worker known as Wardie.1,2,10
Sources disagree: when it closed. This page uses 1981.
In February 1997 The Glenmorangie Company bought the run-down distillery, its brand and its stock from Allied for £7 million, though one account gives £7.7m.1,2,5 Ed Dodson restarted limited production in June 1997, with only five of six washbacks there and two of them leaking badly.6,12 Later shutdowns replaced the cast-iron mash tun, put in a new spirit still and renewed the wiring.6,12 Full production began in 1998, and a visitor centre and café opened in the old malting floors and kiln.1,3,6LVMH bought The Glenmorangie Company on 28 December 2004.2,6,7 Mickey Heads, an Islay native who had managed Jura, took over from Stuart Thomson on 12 March 2007.1,6,14
Sources disagree: when it reopened. This page uses 1997.
In February 2018 Ardbeg unveiled plans to double its stills from two to four and fit more washbacks into the old still house.10,13,15 Colin Gordon, who had managed Lagavulin for Diageo, followed Mickey Heads as manager in 2020.6,14,16 In March 2021 a new still house on the shore opened with two wash stills and two spirit stills.17,18,19 The new stills were built to the exact specification of the old ones, down to the millimetre.17,18,19 In 2022 Historic Environment Scotland listed the malt barns, kilns, mash house, filling house and pier at Category A.2,4 Bryony McNiven was due to take over from Colin Gordon on 1 January 2026, and said in 2026 that she moved into the role that year.20,21
Its malt comes mainly from Port Ellen Maltings, and its manager says it is the most heavily peated malt on Islay, at 55ppm.7,8,10 Its water comes from Loch Uigeadail.6,8,10 The wort, sugary water from the mash, ferments for 54 hours in Oregon pine washbacks.8,10 The spirit stills have a purifier, which sends heavier alcohols back for a partial third distillation and helps refine the spirit.8,10,22 Whiskypedia lists 100% of its spirit as going into single malt.10
