Canada Barrels and Kegs Square Barrel

Around 1963

This barrel was officially known as “Experiment M-290” by Seagram Distillers in the 1960s. Arthur Downey, head of research at Distillers Corporation in Montreal, commissioned Waterloo’s Canada Barrels and Kegs Limited to make the world’s first-ever square oak whisky barrel. Why might you ask? It seems someone had the idea that the shape of the barrel might improve the flavour of the whisky and speed up the maturation process. To test this theory, a standard round barrel and the square barrel were both filled with whisky and left to mature side-by-side. Five years later, the experiment determined there was no difference. The experiment was not considered a failure even though the square barrel was not watertight, tough to move, costly and difficult to build. M-290 was the first and only square barrel made.

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