The 1930s were curiously transitional. The world see-sawed unevenly from the great depression, to the repeal of prohibition, to the brutalities of Spanish Civil War, depicted obliquely in Picasso's Guernica. Ambivalence reigned, no better evidence than with the optimism of the New York World Fair and the bitter outbreak of a second war, both in 1939.

Austere hardship and glorious plenty are both epitomised in the Scottish thistle. Rooted in challenging terrain, it will still erupt into vibrant flower. Scottish iron and steel, those underpinnings of the Industrial Revolution, continued to bind the woodand copper mashtuns, washbacks and stills at The Macallan. Installed the century before, those vessels proudly delivered outturn after outturn.

Moments of beauty at Easter Elchies – promising spring mornings, warm summer days, autumn sunsets – were relished as reminders of the natural world. Domestically, home news travelled at stately progress, propelled by stamps sporting King George V’s head.

Photography by Tim Walker, inspired by The Macallan Estate.

While the patterns of life on the Estate continued, with a little hindsight, these years were elegiac, with many goodbyes in the wind. We may not, in some cases thankfully, see the icons, emblems and events of the 1930s again, but as a lasting, living memento of better days in Scotland, the 1937 Fine & Rare bottling makes for a wonderfully precious and inimitable souvenir.