2016 Château Lafleur, Pomerol, Bordeaux

2016 Château Lafleur, Pomerol, Bordeaux

Product: 20168123998
Prices start from £3,500.00 per case Buying options
2016 Château Lafleur, Pomerol, Bordeaux

Buying options

Available by the case In Bond. Pricing excludes duty and VAT, which must be paid separately before delivery. Storage charges apply.
Case format
Availability
Price per case
3 x 75cl bottle
BBX marketplace BBX 1 case £3,500.00
Soiled Labels
Soiled Labels
You can place a bid for this wine on BBX

Description

This tiny property is just 9.1 acres, with gravel, clay and sand soils. It has all the hallmarks of a little bit of Burgundy in Bordeaux. Elegant and finessed, this is gloriously fresh with attractive red fruit and builds to a super bright finish.

Blend: Cabernet Franc 55%, Merlot 45%

wine at a glance

Delivery and quality guarantee

Critics reviews

Wine Advocate96-98/100
The 2016 Lafleur is a blend of 45% Merlot and 55% Cabernet Franc picked 24-30 September and 11 October, matured in one-third new oak and around 14.3% alcohol. It has a very backward bouquet that demanded a lot of coaxing from the glass. Here there are introspective black fruit, a touch of shucked oyster shell and Japanese nori, opening reluctantly with time in the glass. The palate is medium-bodied with a saline entry, spicier than the 2015 Lafleur when I tasted it from barrel last year, edgy and minerally with a touch of truffle towards the persistent finish. This is a cerebral and yet vivacious Lafleur at this prenatal stage, a great Pomerol that will require a decade in bottle. Baptiste Guinaudeau appeared quietly confident about this latest vintage and he has every right to be. Do afford it plenty of cellaring, though, as it's not a 2016 to appease those without patience.
Neal Martin - Wine Advocate #230, April 2017 Read more
James Suckling99-100/100
This is a young wine that just kicks off at the end with fantastic depth of fruit and intensity. Full-bodied, yet very tight and closed at first. Compact and powerful. Incredible power and structure.
James Suckling - April 2017 Read more

About this WINE

Chateau Lafleur

Chateau Lafleur

Château Lafleur is A tiny 4.5-hectare Pomerol property located opposite Pétrus and producing wines of comparable quality. Lafleur is owned and run by Sylvie and Jacques Guinadeau. Its vineyards are situated on the gravel-rich Pomerol plateau and adjoin those of La Fleur-Pétrus. The soils here are particularly deep and are enriched by deposits of potassium and iron. Only natural fertilisers are used and yields are painfully low, even by Pomerol standards.

Lafleur's wine is typically a blend of Merlot (50%) and Cabernet Franc (50%). It is aged in small oak barrels (50% new) for 18 months. Wines from Lafleur display a spectacularly intense perfume (partly attributable to the high percentage of Cabernet Franc in the blend) and display layers and layers of concentrated, black fruits, minerals, tobacco spices and creamy liquorice on the palate. The best vintages can last for up to 50 years.

Find out more
Pomerol

Pomerol

Pomerol is the smallest of Bordeaux's major appellations, with about 150 producers and approximately 740 hectares of vineyards. It is home to many bijou domaines, many of which produce little more than 1,000 cases per annum.

Both the topography and architecture of the region is unremarkable, but the style of the wines is most individual. The finest vineyards are planted on a seam of rich clay which extends across the gently-elevated plateau of Pomerol, which runs from the north-eastern boundary of St Emilion. On the sides of the plateau, the soil becomes sandier and the wines lighter.

For a long time Pomerol was regarded as the poor relation of St Emilion, but the efforts of Jean-Pierre Moueix in the mid-20th century brought the wine to the attention of more export markets, where its fleshy, intense and muscular style found a willing audience, in turn leading to surge in prices led by the demand for such limited quantities.

There is one satellite region to the immediate north, Lalande-de-Pomerol whose wines are stylistically very similar, if sometimes lacking the finesse of its neighbour. There has never been a classification of Pomerol wines.

Recommended Châteaux : Ch. Pétrus, Vieux Ch. Certan, Le Pin, Ch. L’Eglise-Clinet, Ch. La Conseillante, Ch. L’Evangile, Ch. Lafleur, Trotanoy, Ch. Nenin, Ch. Beauregard, Ch. Feytit-Clinet, Le Gay.

Find out more
Merlot

Merlot

The most widely planted grape in Bordeaux and a grape that has been on a relentless expansion drive throughout the world in the last decade. Merlot is adaptable to most soils and is relatively simple to cultivate. It is a vigorous naturally high yielding grape that requires savage pruning - over-cropped Merlot-based wines are dilute and bland. It is also vital to pick at optimum ripeness as Merlot can quickly lose its varietal characteristics if harvested overripe.

In St.Emilion and Pomerol it withstands the moist clay rich soils far better than Cabernet grapes, and at it best produces opulently rich, plummy clarets with succulent fruitcake-like nuances. Le Pin, Pétrus and Clinet are examples of hedonistically rich Merlot wines at their very best. It also plays a key supporting role in filling out the middle palate of the Cabernet-dominated wines of the Médoc and Graves.

Merlot is now grown in virtually all wine growing countries and is particularly successful in California, Chile and Northern Italy.

Find out more