The largest collection of Johnnie Walker bottles ever assembled by a single private collector will go to auction in September.
With over 1,600 full-sized bottles, 1,000 miniatures and a further 1,000 pieces of advertising and memorabilia, the comprehensive collection is rivaled only by Diageo’s own behind-closed-doors archives.
Its owner, Frans Op den Kamp, spent 20 years amassing the collection after falling in love with a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue Label in 1999. It includes incredibly rare bottles such as the 1805 Celebration Blend, which was limited to 200 bottles and gifted to high-achieving people.
Due to his collection and the extensive traveling he has had to do to build it, Op den Kamp is now considered a leading expert on the history of the brand, which started as a grocery store in 1820.
He has entrusted the collection to specialists Whisky Auctioneer, which will host an online auction from September 11-21. It has had to consign the collection from California to its headquarters in Scotland and is still being catalogued ahead of the auction.
“Parting with the collection is certainly not easy,” he said. “But I feel I have achieved what I set out to do. I hope these bottles find their way to collectors who discover something that resonates with them, whether that’s a particular whisky, a moment in Johnnie Walker’s history or simply the thrill of the hunt. Most of all, I hope it inspires a renewed appreciation for the art of blending and the story of Scotch whisky.”
Blended malts have been much derided in the age of the single malt, but Johnnie Walker remains the highest-selling and most-recognizable Scotch brand in the world. Its famous Striding Man has had many iterations, and the collection catalougs its evolution through a collection of vintage adverts dating back to the 1900s.
Dr. Nick Morgan, author of the Johnnie Walker book ‘A Long Stride: The Story of the World’s No.1 Scotch Whisky’, said: “These objects reveal how the brand evolved from the first appearance of the iconic Striding Man figure in 1908 into the world’s best-selling Scotch whisky. Collections like this are invaluable because they allow us to experience history not just through documents and written records, but through the bottles, labels and objects that people actually bought, drank and occasionally kept for posterity.”
To register for the auction, click here.
