O.F.C.

Old Fashioned Copper.

In 1869, Colonel E.H. Taylor, Jr. established a distillery on the banks of the Kentucky River outside Frankfort, and a year later christened it O.F.C. — Old Fashioned Copper. It was the most state-of-the-art distillery of its time: copper fermentation vats, column stills, and a pioneering steam heating system that still warms the ageing warehouses of Buffalo Trace today.

The O.F.C. Vintages honour that place — now a National Historic Landmark — in the rarest form the distillery offers. Each bourbon is vintage-dated to the year it was distilled and hand-bottled in a crystal decanter with inlaid copper lettering, presented in a wooden case with a provenance card recording the notable events of its distilling year.

The programme began not as commerce but as generosity: the first release of just two hundred bottles — drawn from 1980, 1982 and 1983 — was given, without charge, to non-profit organisations to raise money for their causes. Vintages since have remained exceptionally scarce, drawn only when a year's barrels are judged ready.