What happens when you cross fine Scotch whisky with ultramodern wristwatches? THIS.
Normally, when you cross a whisky and a watch, you get pictures of watches on whisky bottles, like the one I took of a Christopher Ward atop this lovely Macallan 30 year. But sometimes, you get mad genius. To rehearse, watches are unnecessary frivolity in this modern life. We don’t have clock towers in the town square courthouse ringing to remind us of the hour in most cities any more. We don’t need to check our wrists when we can check our very accurate network synchronized mobile phones. We certainly don’t make a habit of carrying a flask about in our coat pockets and having a sip throughout the day as our ancestors might have.
But here we are. Urwerk, that wonderful avant-garde mechanical watch company, friend of sharp edges and unusual ways of displaying the time, have partnered with the Macallan, the 193 year old distillery in Scotland. Not to make a timepiece, mind you, although I’d be interested in how that might work; Instead, they’ve made a flask for carrying Scotch.
The flask has all the angles of its Urwerk watch brethren, with some useful features for Scotch as well. You might well ask, isn’t this just a branding exercise? And it might be – but it’s one that involves 156 mechanical parts. That’s what happens when you bring watchmakers to the party– And serve Scotch. This wonderful thing took two whole years to develop. What makes it different from the chrome flask you pick up for cheap at the Dollar Tree? Don’t insult me.
It’s Titanium. The lightweight, super strong, wonder-alloy, coated in black, like Urwerk watches. There are twin tanks inside, so that you can store different expressions of the Macallan. Some prefer the 30 year, others like a sherry cask expression. Here, you can keep both. And there are rotating labeled wheels in the base of it to keep track of what expressions are in each tank. The base of the flask has a spring loaded door to allow easier adjusting of the rotating labels.
Those are nice features, but they aren’t the real use here. If you have a very pleasant 30 year Sherry cask, and a more affordable 12 year fine oak, you can put one in each tank, and rotate the mouthpiece to select between them. If you were a poor mannered friend, you could rotate it to give the more readily available 12 year to a friend, and when they pass it back, rotate it to keep the 30 year for yourself. Don’t do this. Sharing a flask is a sacred act of friendship, that moment of true bonding, sharing something so private. Using a flask, even a black machined one made in conjunction with watchmakers, is not about showing off – it’s about stealing a moment to enjoy simpler pleasures, in an appropriate setting.
The Macallan x Urwerk Flask is limited to 500 pieces, and is available exclusively through Macallan’s website at www.themacallan.com at a price of £1,995.
