The £850k whisky bottle (...that’s £28k a dram!)

THE world’s most expensive bottle of whisky sold at auction for £850,000 yesterday – or £28,000 per glass.

The Macallan Valerio Adami 1926 is one of only 12 made and is viewed by experts as the ‘holy grail’.

Another bottle of the 60-year whisky was sold for the previous record of £814,000 in Hong Kong in May.

The whisky, pictured, which was distilled in a vat for 60 years from 1926 then bottled, is sought after for its rarity, vintage and unique artwork by Italian pop artist Valerio Adami.

The Macallan distillery commissioned Mr Adami and British artist Peter Blake to design 12 labels each for a limited edition of 24 bottles.

The 75cl single malt’s previous owner bought it from the Highlands distillery for an undisclosed sum in 1994. The unknown winning bidder paid a hammer price of £700,000 and a buyer’s premium of £148,750.

The sale price means that a dram – a 25ml measure – would cost £28,000 if its owner decided to open the bottle.

Martin Green, of Bonhams in Edinburgh, which held the auction, said: ‘It is a great honour to have established a new world record, and particularly exciting to have done so here in Scotland, the home of whisky.

‘The Macallan has been described as the holy grail of whisky. The most serious collectors wait many years for a bottle to come on the market.’

It is not known how many bottles of the Adamis still exist. One is said to have been destroyed in an earthquake in Japan in 2011 and another to have been opened and drunk.