Kavalan Distillery is a Taiwanese whisky distillery. It is owned by the King Car Group and is located at Yuanshan Township, Yilan County, Taiwan.
History
The distillery is named after the old name of Yilan County. The distillery was completed in December 2005, produced its first spirit in March 2006, and released its first bottling in December 2008.
After its first few runs, Kavalan bought a new set of much larger German stills to expand production. After experimenting with these stills from 2008 to 2010, they decided to retire them as the alcohol produced was too processed and it didn’t allow them to work with texture and flavor.
In January 2010, one of the distillery's products caused a stir by beating three Scotch whiskies and one English whisky in a blind tasting organised in Leith, Scotland, to celebrate Burns Night.
The distillery was named by Whisky Magazine as the World Icons of Whisky "Whisky Visitor Attraction of the Year" for 2011, and its products have won several other awards.
In 2012, Kavalan's Solist Fino Sherry Cask malt whisky was named "new whisky of the year" by Jim Murray in his guide, Jim Murray’s Whisky Bible.[1]