What Does The Macallan's Master of Wood Do & Why Does it Matter?

When Stuart MacPherson started working at the Clyde Cooperage in Glasgow, Scotland as a teenage cooper’s apprentice, little did he know that he would slowly rise through the ranks till one day he was given a job with The Macallan that was so unique they had to invent a job title for him. MacPherson became their Master of Wood.

 The Journey of The Macallan’s Barrels

From someone who began his working life learning how to turn 30 or so staves into a single barrel, in 2012 he became responsible for sourcing every tree, every stave, every barrel for The Macallan, one of the three biggest single malt whisky distilleries in the world. Since then, give or take a pandemic, he has flown 2-3 times a year to both the USA and to Spain, inspecting forests, cooperages, and Spanish bodegas, where The Macallan’s barrels are aged with sherry before being emptied and shipped to the distillery on Speyside in the Scottish Highlands.

The whole process, from felling a tree to the barrels made from it reaching Speyside, can take 5-6 years, MacPherson explains.

“[The process] involves the felling of the trees in Northern Spain and Southern France,” he says, “down to actually air-drying the wood prior to constructing the cask, before seasoning them with sherry and then sending them to The Macallan. All The Macallan casks are constructed and seasoned to our specific specifications and controlled and monitored by our auditing team in Jerez to ensure that continuity and consistency are achieved throughout the process.”

The process is also an expensive one, as the sherry casks that The Macallan predominantly uses are several times more expensive than the ex-bourbon casks favored by the majority of Scotland’s whisky distilleries. By doing this, The Macallan is maintaining an older tradition than the newer ‘tradition’ of using ex-bourbon casks.

The History of Sherry Casks in Scotland

This dates all the way back to 1587 when the English explorer and privateer Sir Francis Drake took a fleet of ships to Spain in an attempt to disrupt the preparations of the Spanish Armada. The king of Spain was known to be getting ready to send a fleet of his own with the intention of invading the UK. Drake’s pre-emptive strike not only delayed the plans but he seized various bits of booty, including 2,900 casks of sherry.

The drink was unknown in the UK at the time, but quickly became popular, and remains so to this day. Rather than being returned, the sherry casks were sold on and used to store what at the time was basically Scottish moonshine. As whisky production became more sophisticated, it was discovered that aging the spirit in sherry casks added depths of flavour to the drink.

Sherry casks became the accepted aging method in Scotland until the late 1930s, when the legal definition of bourbon was created, stating that bourbon barrels could be used only once. This created a glut of bourbon barrels on the international market, and as these were much cheaper than sherry barrels, Scottish whisky-makers began importing them. This naturally changed the flavor profiles of their whiskies, but some distillers like The Macallan have preferred to stick with sherry barrels, though with some bourbon-barrel aging too.

American Oak for Spanish Casks for Scottish Whiskey

This is why, till the pandemic struck, MacPherson spent so much time on the road. His trips to the USA (which he’s hoping will resume soon) were to source wood for shipping to Spain.

“Our American oak,” he says, “is harvested in Ohio, Missouri, and Kentucky, when they are approximately 70 years old. As American oak is denser than its European relative, it is perfectly suited for creating our sherry seasoned casks.”

Even this American-sourced wood is shipped not to Scotland but to Jerez, the sherry capital of Spain, where MacPherson will oversee the cooperages which turn the wood into barrels, and the bodegas which use the barrels to age sherry before they’re ready – finally – to go to Scotland and their first contact with whisky. Why go to so much trouble, though, when you could simply buy cheaper ex-bourbon casks and skip Spain altogether?

“At The Macallan, up to 80 percent of our whisky’s characteristics and 100 percent of its natural color comes from our casks, which is why we invest significantly in our wood. Our casks are the single greatest contributor to our outstanding character, distinctive aromas and flavors, and natural color of our whisky,” explains MacPherson. In other words, the whisky is in the wood, and after almost ten years in the job, Stuart MacPherson is still the master of it.