This year’s tasting was held remotely with a judging panel comprising Billy Abbott, ambassador for The Whisky Exchange, Matt Chambers and Karen Taylor, co‐founders of the Whisky for Everyone blog and chaired by Melita Kiely, editor of The Spirits Business magazine.

To ensure each entry was judged solely on the liquid, each whisky was decanted and shipped anonymously.

“This award underlines the quality of whisky we are able to make – guided by our master whisky maker Max McFarlane,” says distillery CEO Martin McAdam.

“Our very first whisky, Expedition, was awarded a gold medal in the 2019 Scottish Whisky Awards, with Coppersmith scooping silver in the same awards the following year. This now makes it a hat-trick for Ardgowan.

“We now only have a few dozen bottles of Coppersmith available for general sale – that is the nature of limited-edition whisky. After they are sold, we will retain a very limited supply for sale as part of the Clydebuilt Collection and for our distillery opening.

“But the good news is out latest release Shipwright is now available online and we are receiving great feedback from our growing base of fans.

“In the months and years ahead we will be releasing more whiskies in the Clydebuilt series, as well as ultra-limited one-offs in our Discovery series, and we hope for more awards to come,”

“The news of the win comes hot on the heels of our successful fundraising which will see the new distillery at Ardgowan become operational in 2023.

“We intend to bring the skills we have honed during the selection, blending, and bottling of the Clydebuilt whiskies to the Ardgowan single malt production.

“Our chairman Willie Phillips and our master whisky maker Max McFarlane both emphasise the importance of quality in everything we do. While sales of our own single malt is a few years away – our customers will know what to expect when it arrives,” McAdam concludes.