Despite being only 21 years old, Lochranza Distillery on the Isle of Arran is the latest in a long line of distilleries that once existed there. The island's illicit whisky that was made in the 18th century was considered so good that it was on a par with the best smuggled Glenlivet and the Skye traveller John MacCulloch recorded in 1824 that Arran Water, as it was called, 'in the older days, was the burgundy of all the vintages.' The last legal distillery on Arran closed in 1837 and it was not until David Hutchison, a Glasgow architect whose family had property on Arran, attended a dinner of the Arran Society of Glasgow in March 1991, that the idea to start a new distillery took seed. He approached his friend Harold Currie, a retired ex-Chivas Regal MD, and together they brought about the creation of Lochranza Distillery which started production in June 1995. But that's not the whole story as the project was beset by NIMBY objectors, nesting eagles, licensing problems, SNH concerns re
