Every Johnnie Walker Blue Label Limited Edition – Part 4

One of the world’s most renowned and rarest whiskies, Johnnie Walker Blue Label represents the pinnacle of luxury within the Johnnie Walker range, the best-selling whisky brand globally. Crafted from an intricate blend of Scotland’s most exceptional and scarce whiskies, Blue Label continues to attract worldwide acclaim for its elegance, smoothness, and depth of flavor. This premium expression has become a coveted collectible among whisky enthusiasts, partly due to its rarity and the brand’s dedication to quality and craftsmanship.

Owned by Diageo, Johnnie Walker Blue Label has expanded its allure through limited-edition releases and exclusive collaborations, with around 300 unique bottlings to date. The final installment in this four-part series delves into the latest special editions and exclusive Asian market offerings, such as the annual New Year expression. Read part one here, two here, and three here.

Johnnie Walker Blue Label Limited Editions 2023 & 2024 

In 2023, Johnnie Walker released two global limited-edition Blue Labels, reimagining the blended whisky’s traditional flavor profile and style. One of the blends, Blue Label: Xordinare was finished in XO Cognac casks. For the second blend, Johnnie Walker’s Master Blender, Emma Walker, collaborated with a world-renowned Japanese chef, Kei Kobayashi, to create Blue Label: Elusive Umami, producing a blend encapsulating the enigmatic taste of umami – balancing savory sweet flavors. 

Johnnie Walker also once more partnered with illustrator, James Weston Lewis, to create exclusives featuring 3-sided artwork celebrating the US states, Texas and New York, in 2023. The Texas edition’s design integrated elements of state life including bluebonnets (the state flower), a rodeo, oil drilling, and cattle ranching – at the fictional ‘Keep Walking’ ranch. For Blue Label: New York, Lewis created a cityscape illustration including the Statue of Liberty – whilst the ‘Striding Man’ emblem was centered in the outline of a ‘Big Apple’. 

For a series of Philippines exclusives, the brand approached local toy designer and graffiti artist, Quiccs, to create designs based upon his Mecha character TEQ63. The Quiccs featured the artist’s fan-favorite TEQ63 color schemes, The Manila Killer, the Dragon, and OG Blue. In Vietnam, ten different Blue Label exclusives were released across 2023-2024, with six commemorating the festivals of love, including the Thousand Love, Forever Love, and Rose Paradise editions – a further edition was also released with ‘Happy Birthday’. For Vietnam’s Year of the Dragon 2024 celebrations, three dragon artwork designs were released.

Chinese and Asian New Year 2014 To 2024 Releases 

Since 2014, Johnnie Walker has released an annual Blue Label limited release to commemorate the Asian New Year, although in some years two editions were released across different markets. 

The first Asian New Year edition, released for the Year of the Horse 2014, was launched exclusively for the Asian market. Similarly, the bottling for the Year of the Ram 2015, was only available in Taiwan. In 2016, two different editions were released for the Year of the Monkey, a general release that featured an illustration of the zodiac animal in gold detailing on a blue bottle, and a travel exclusive using blue detailing on a white bottle with only 750 bottles produced. Two editions were also released for the Year of the Rooster in 2017, a general release and a 4,000-bottle exclusive design for Malaysia. 

Whilst early Asian New Year Blue Label editions featured traditional images of zodiac animals since 2018, Johnnie Walker has partnered with a prominent or upcoming Asian artist or designer to create a single general release with vibrant artwork of zodiac animals. This began with the Year of the Dog 2018 edition, designed by Taiwanese artist, Page Tsou. 

The Year of the Pig 2019 edition was created by English designer, Chrissy Lau, whose illustration was inspired by her Chinese heritage, and signature intricate patterns. Chinese artist, Shirley Gong, partnered with the brand on both the Year of the Rat 2020 and Year of the Ox 2021 editions. 

In 2022, Chinese artist, Shan Jiang depicted the Year of the Tiger bottling as a symbol of strength and progress. Fashion designer, Angel Chen, created a modern interpretation of a sprightly rabbit for Blue Label’s Year of the Rabbit 2023 bottling. For the Year of the Dragon 2024 bottling, contemporary artist, James Jean’s mythical dragon is interwoven with botanical elements. 

Vietnam Exclusives

Vietnam has become one of the most popular markets for specially labeled Blue Label exclusives – many featuring designs relating to Vietnamese mythology, culture, or landmarks.  There is only limited information available about the majority of the Vietnamese editions, making details including release year, artwork creator, and production run size difficult to determine. 

In 2022, Johnnie Walker partnered with Vietnamese photography artist Rehahn, creating a series of five editions that showcased some of his most famous photographs – only 100 bottles were produced per design. 

The remaining Vietnam exclusives include bottlings symbolizing ‘The Tet Dragon’ and ‘Save the Date’ wedding exclusives. In 2023, ‘Year of the Cat’ and ‘Bonjour Vietnam’ bottlings were launched, while the most recent bottlings have celebrated, Lucky Money Bags, Ha Long Bay, and Vietnam’s rare Golden Cats. 

Johnnie Walker Blue Label Limited Edition Sets 

While the majority of Johnnie Walker’s Blue Label editions are released as single bottles, a small number of multi-bottle collectors’ sets have been produced predominantly for the Asian whisky market. The known Blue Label sets have been created around themes such as the Chinese zodiac and rare animals, bay cities, and gods and mythology. 

There is only limited information available about most of these sets, as most were only produced in small numbers and have been available for wider circulation and purchase. The Chinese zodiac has inspired two 12-bottle sets illustrated with the different zodiac animals, one was produced in 100cl bottles, and the second 20cl bottles.

The Blue Label: Bay Cities Collection was an 11-bottle set presented in 75 bottles, with a cityscape scene engraved in gold detailing – if positioned in the correct order the scene flows across all 11 bottles. Inspired by rare and endangered animals, the Blue Label: Rare Animals set was bottled exclusively for the Chinese market, a 12-bottle set of 20cl bottles illustrated with colorful illustrations of endangered species, including tigers, pandas, and elephants. 

Themes of astrology and mythology have inspired a number of the Blue Label sets. The Blue Label: Astrology Collection is a trilogy of 75cl bottlings each engraved with detailing depicting the different constellations which make up the night sky. The remaining sets are inspired by gods and mythology, including bottle sets that are illustrated with Mexican Warriors, China’s Five Gods and Gods of Wealth, and the Dragon Edition created for the D-Royal Group.