Diageo’s Event Partnership with Scottish Ballet is indeed rare and exceptional — delivering unique and outstanding events for a shared network of clients, patrons and corporate partners.

This spirited partnership emerged from working together in 2021 on the bottling and sale of the highly collectible 26 year old Royal Lochnagar The Sleeping Beauty whisky from Diageo’s Casks of Distinction programme. The project was a huge success, generating over £200,000 for the Scottish Ballet Endowment Fund through a private auction. With Diageo’s grand opening of the landmark Johnnie Walker Princes Street that summer, the timing was just right to explore further innovative collaborations together.

Diageo and Scottish Ballet both engage with local and global individuals who have a shared love of ballet, craftsmanship, and Scotch. The partnership delivers mutual benefit in offering unique experiences to clients and audiences. Working together on a series of bespoke events throughout the year, Diageo and Scottish Ballet’s collective creativity ensures the curation of tailored experiences like no other.

To launch the first year of partnership, Scottish Ballet worked closely with Diageo on our 2022 Fundraising Gala at the Festival Theatre Edinburgh. Diageo designed a ‘Rare & Exceptional’ custom made ballet bar, with a bar front decorated with over 400 used pointe shoes and themed to complement the Coppélia influenced futuristic stage design. This statement bar was not only a talking point of the evening, but also kept guests’ thirst at bay with a range of ballet themed cocktails — Tendu & Tonic, anyone?

With a series of co-hosted events in the pipeline, this valued partnership will no doubt go from (whisky) strength to strength.