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Whisky Auctioneer to offer rare Karuizawa 1960
Online Scotch whisky auction company, Whisky Auctioneer, will offer “the world’s largest known collection” of rare and collectable Karuizawa whisky from Japan including a bottle of Karuizawa 1960 in early April, the company has announced.
The collection consists of 290 bottles and is estimated to fetch over £500,000. Built up over the last 10 years by a European collector, the collection covers almost every expression created by Karuizawa.
“A collection of this size from one of the world’s most collectable distilleries has never previously been seen at auction, so we’re absolutely thrilled to have fought off some stiff competition to lead the sale,” commented Iain McClune, founder and owner of Whisky Auctioneer.
One of the highlights at the upcoming auction will be a bottle of Karuizawa 1960, which was last sold at an auction in Hong Kong for £96,000 in 2015, setting a new record for a Japanese whisky.
Over 230 of the bottles are single casks and include some exceptionally rare bottlings such as the 1963 50-year-old and the 1964 48-year-old bottled for Wealth Solutions.
In addition to the very rare bottle of 1960, the average price paid for each bottle within the collection is expected to top £2,000, although some of these bottles are likely to sell for considerably more, the company said.
Karuizawa whisky has become one of the world’s most coveted whiskies since the distillery stopped production in 2000. In recent years, Japanese whiskies have enjoyed increased popularity in the secondary market. The RWK (Rare Whisky Karuizawa) Index, which tracks the performance of a select collection of bottles from this now dormant Japanese distillery, shows an increase in value of more than 300% since July 2013. A bottle of Yamazaki 50-year-old set a new record for the most expensive bottle of whisky sold at auction in the UK, reaching £62,600.
Whisky Auctioneer will open bidding for the 290 lots at 11.00am (GMT+1) on Wednesday 5th April and close the auction at 7pm on Monday 17th April.