To What Matters

Tomatin's story is one of shared purpose, respect for tradition and the bonds that make every dram a tribute to home

- by EUAN DUGUID

SOME distilleries greet you with splendour, glass and grandeur. Tomatin, high on the Highlands, speaks in quieter tones.

It is a place where whisky is less a product than a lived inheritance, and few embody that better than Scott Adamson.

Today he helps shape the spirit as blender, but his career began humbly. He joined Tomatin as a research assistant after studying history, before spending over a decade as global brand ambassador, carrying the distillery's story to every corner of the whisky world.

“The stories that really stuck with me,” he says, “aren’t the ones on paper, but the ones swapped over a dram. These are the stories that really brought the community of Tomatin to life for me.”

One tale he uncovered was of founder John MacDougall, who was born and bred in Tomatin.

“He was the shopkeeper, postmaster, registrar, justice of the peace and factor of the local estate,” Adamson explains. “He was fully committed to developing the small community of Tomatin, and with the construction of the railway line, he was able to bring modern industry, in the form of a distillery, to the area.”

Walk the grounds today and you still sense that intent.