Most Expensive Holiday Gifts: Macallan 64 Lalique Decanter

A charity connection can help a staggering purchase go down as smoothly as 64-year-old Scotch — a bottle of which sold at auction at Sotheby’s New York on November 15 to an undisclosed buyer. The pricey single-malt whiskey has notes of rosin, treacle and peat smoke and is packaged in a specially designed Lalique decanter. Proceeds go to an organization that brings safe drinking water to developing nations. For shoppers on a budget, the Macallan also sold 10 “tiny tastes” around the world; prices ranged from a low of $5,000 in Paris to a high of $41,000 in Taipei. The U.S. taste went for a middling $16,000.

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