Gallery of 12

Old world craft meets new tech

The scotch drinker used to be characterized as a 50-something year old businessman, conservative in his views and part of a walled-off elite class. But that’s changed. Now, the biggest emerging demographic of scotch drinkers are evenly split between men and women, 25-35.

To reach out to this new generation of scotch drinkers, The Macallan wanted to do something fresh, modern and engaging to showcase their 12 year scotches. That’s how we ended up with ‘The Gallery of 12”, an AR experience that celebrated The Macallan’s storied history and traditional craftsmanship but delivered it in a positively new way.

The event took place in an art gallery in New York and used Microsoft’s HoloLense technology to bring different stages of the whisky making process to life. If you were to walk through the gallery without putting the HoloLense on, you’d see empty frames and plinths without sculptures. With them on, however, you were seeing things such as the forests that The Macallan sources the wood for their casks from, or the process that the whisky takes to gain its signature color.

The history of The Macallan is impressive but what they’re really known for, of course, is their distinct taste. So, in addition to an informative AR experience, we curated a “blind” tasting/paring menu that taught people how to judge and taste scotch as well as what pairs well with the beverage and why.

To open the experience up, The Macallan is not only going to host this event in other key cities (SF, Houston, Chicago and Miami) but they also made an app for iOS so that everyone can experience The Gallery of 12 and learn what makes The Macallan the best scotch distillery in the world.

Overall, the experience generated over 115 million media impressions, 2.1 million users reached on social channels, 110,000 social video views, 1.7 million ARKit app impressions, giving whisky connoisseurs around the world a taste of the augmented future.

Recognition Received:

Shorty Awards

Gold Distinction in Physical & Digital.

C. 2017 - Tool of North America