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T his July, Sotheby’s Paris presents an exquisite single-owner collection of whisky & rum including many full original cases, the scale of which is unlikely to ever be seen again. Ahead of the sale, we sat down with Umberto Angeloni, former CEO of Brioni and Caruso, the man responsible for assembling this substantial collection to find out more about his own whisky journey, and the drams which inspired his passion.
James Gray: When did you first get interested in whisky?
Umberto Angeloni: It was in the late 90’s, and I was CEO of Brioni. We had a leather clothing factory in Bologna, so I went there regularly. The best place for upscale traditional cuisine and very special drinks, I was told, was Sandro al Navile, in the campagna around the town. As I approached the restaurant, at the bottom of a country road, I saw the top of a big, old copper still in the garden, clearly from Scotland. As if that wasn’t surprising enough, next to the entrance there was a window display with whisky bottles from very old vintages.
It was here that I met the restaurant’s owner, Sandro Montanari. “Sandro is the greatest collector of whisky in the world”, my host said most seriously, and soon Sandro had joined me at the table to answer my many questions about the liquor, which he concluded by opening a square-shaped bottle that read ‘Glen Avon 25’: “This is my favourite single malt whisky”, he said, “smell it carefully, then one more time, and then take a little sip and let it conquer your mouth”. I was forever conquered…
For me, this proved a basic rule of experience in the realm of luxury: the first trial of a product, any product, should be done with the assistance of a master, and at the highest possible level of quality.
What sort of whiskies were you drinking at the start of your journey?
Fortunately I had not developed much of a taste for whisky at the time, but was happy to drink a good XO Cognac in Europe or an aged Tequila when in the US. I must confess that I didn't even know the proper meaning of ‘Single Malt’. Fortunately, I say, because that allowed me to approach whisky without any preconceived notion. I was also fortunate to possess that inherent curiosity for discovering new territories in the realm of taste and acquired skills to distinguish excellence when found; both necessary to properly navigate the world of luxury.
How did your friendship with Sandro develop?
I was fascinated by this unfathomable liquor and happy that Sandro’s stories proved another truth: Italians are not only excellent in the creative part of luxury, but also in the consumption of it. In particular, they are especially good at absorbing the excellence that comes from different parts of the world and eventually even taking them to new levels, like with single malt whisky for example. This is what I define as ‘Good Italian-ism!’.
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How did Sandro influence the way you thought about, tasted and collected whisky?
He made me taste and comment on different whiskies including peaty single malts (one of his favourites was Ardbeg 10 Year Old from the late 1970s). He taught me to discern the different flavours, showed me how 5 Year Old whisky distilled pre-1970 could be superior to one three times older but more distilled more recently.
He showed me how to appreciate cask-strength and non-filtered whisky and shared his opinions on the design of the labels and the shape of the bottles (he disliked the porcelaine bottles and was ‘tepid’ on the decanters), etc.
It was a fantastic journey in a seemingly endless universe, with exotic names such as “Dallas Dhu” and fancy labels everywhere. Clearly, to be the pupil of such a master has made me quite fastidious in my subsequent whisky opinions. He was especially adamant about one thing - he was not a collector! Rather he was a refined consumer who wanted to acquire the best whiskeys before they would not be found (and especially could not be produced) anymore.
What prompted your love for Glen Avon and why is it so special to you?
I guess you could say it was ‘love at first sip!’. Of course I tasted other excellent whiskies, but the Glen Avon 25 Year Old had something special to it: the smell is gently flowery and a distant note of honey makes you think that it could be somewhat sweet, but the mouth tells you that it’s seriously dry and refined.
I have had other first-time drinkers try it, and the feedback was always very good. Even those who said they did not like hard liquors were eventually seduced by Glen Avon (these ‘conversions’ cost me several bottles as gifts!). The only other single malt that I found very similar in taste, was the Macallan-Glenlivet 40 Year Old.
I also loved the label: so unpretentious and clearly revealing of the provenance: the little avon, the salmon fisherman, the stag… no nonsense, no surprises (I suspect that Sandro had something to do with it). The original Glen Avon 25 had a white label, but it was no longer available in the market. Soon Sandro found a good cask at a wholesaler, which had just matured, and he shared it with me. It was around this time around that the green coloured label was produced.
Tell us about the Glen Avon 35 Year Old, its creation, and how you came to possess so many cases
One happy day, Sandro phoned me and said that he had found a unique cask of 35 Year Old Glen Avon, of which he sent me a small sample: “Never found before”, he said, “and never bottled either”. He offered to share the bottles with me (approx. 100 each), and suggested that to appreciate its full complexity we should leave it unfiltered and undiluted, with the bottle and label also remaining the same. Of course, I obliged and it was the right thing to do, as the Glen Avon 35 is indeed unique in its taste and rarity. It's certainly a connoisseur's choice, as has been noted when it scored well at high-level tastings where bottles have magically appeared! (the Glen Avon 35 was scored 92 points by Serge Valentin of Whiskyfun in 2010).
What are your favourite bottles in the collection?
I bought many of the bottles that I tasted at Sandro’s, such as the Macallan-Glenlivet 40 Year Old, and also got some from the few other big Italian collectors who were willing to separate themselves from their beloved bottles. Naturally, I bought every conceivable aging and bottling of Glen Avon I could find, sometimes even a bottle displayed in ‘out of the way’ bars, and put together a special collection of them. In the peaty category I also bought lots of Ardbeg, especially the exceptional Ardbeg 30 Year Old ‘Very Rare’ in the black wooden box. Most importantly I only ever bought whisky that I believed I would enjoy drinking, no matter if the label was famous or not.
Before I knew it, I had over a thousand bottles in stock, and since I moved abroad and so did my five children (all to different countries) it became difficult to imagine being able to drink it or have it shipped around.
You also wrote a book on whisky. How did this idea come about?
The idea that an Italian was the biggest collector and top connoisseur of whisky, that the whole market of extra-aged single malts was started by Italians and that Italy was the largest consumer in the world of such whiskies, was very intriguing. How many people actually knew that? Should it not be known to all the world, also as additional proof of Italians’ expertise and, forgive me, superiority, when it comes to taste and style? From this the idea of a book to tell this story was born, which I titled: Single Malt Whisky: An Italian Passion.
The book includes a paragraph about the ‘big five’ Italian collectors. How did you go about researching and interviewing them?
This step was a little difficult, but I was able to extract the names and contacts of the other collectors from Sandro (there was always a bit of rivalry among them), and I had to reassure him that he would always be featured as the numero uno!
I soon concluded that four others were in the same top league: Eduardo Giaccone, Giuseppe Begnoni, Valentino Zagatti and Antonio Casari. Each of them had over 2000 different types of whisky, plenty of anecdotes to tell, and some interesting characteristics about their collections. Casari, for example, had almost exclusively decanters. He also had the most extraordinary ensemble of ‘Italian whisky’ (made under fascism, when it was forbidden to import from the UK). They were all happy and a little surprised to be featured in a book and Zagatti, who was blind but could recognise whiskies by the smell and by touching the label, generously opened a special bottle for us to taste together.
The book was launched in 2000 together with a bottling of 24 Year Old Glenlivet in 20 cl. format, featuring the book’s cover as label, and it finally gave the Italians their long-due recognition in creating the single-malt whisky status as it is today.
You have an acclaimed background in tailoring and men's luxury fashion. How do you feel whisky fits into this ‘Italian lifestyle’ alongside the clothing, food and culture?
My background is in management of luxury men’s fashion companies, such as Brioni and Caruso. To clients who can afford everything, the important and not so easy thing to acquire is the knowledge of quality, especially in niche products such as whisky, and to develop the skills necessary to maximize their experience. The attitude and the ability are mostly the same, no matter the category of products or services.
Therefore, as a luxury consumer myself, I wrote books on such rarefied topics as single malt whisky, the boutonnière, wellness of the Spa experience, and even produced three short videos with an Italian icon, Giancarlo Giannini (“The Good Italian”). They all related to the same thing that I always come back to: Good Italian-ism!
Fine & Rare Whisky | The Umberto Angeloni Collection closes with an online-only auction at Sotheby’s Paris on Tuesday 9 July from 13.00 CEST. Everything in the sale is offered with no reserve.
