2017 Château Léoville Las Cases, St Julien, Bordeaux
Critics reviews
Rich ruby in colour if a little less inky than the 2015, 2016 or 2018. With clear layers of fruit, the nose is one of the rare ones in the vintage where you just want to think about the different strands coming at you. Black truffle, liquorice, cinnamon spice, saffron, slate, and cigar box are all comprised. This is a standout vintage wine. They just know how to tease flavour out of the ground at this place. Yes, it is closed, not exactly forbidding but certainly austere, with big tannins, but less so than in some vintages at this stage, and it unrolls in the mouth.
Drink 2027 - 2040
Jane Anson, Decanter.com (November 2019)
The 2017 Léoville Las-Cases, which was bottled in July 2019, has a fragrant bouquet with rose petal and briary aromas married with cranberry, pomegranate and raspberry. A touch of tobacco emerges with time. It is certainly a more understated bouquet for this property. The palate is medium-bodied with supple tannin and a fine bead of acidity. This feels very pure and harmonious, quite complex, more so than in barrel, with darker, more savoury and ferrous fruit towards the finish. This is an excellent Léoville Las-Cases with plenty of character.
Drink 2023 - 2050
Neal Martin, Vinous.com (January 2020)
The 2017 Léoville Las Cases captures all the best the vintage has to offer. Rich, unctuous and stunning in its beauty, the 2017 possesses tremendous richness and textural intensity that carry through to the very long finish, all with the regal, statuesque feel that is the quintessential signature of Las Cases. Just as it was from barrel, Las Cases is wonderfully polished. Tasted two times. What a wine!
Drink 2027 - 2047
Antonio Galloni, Vinous.com (March 2020)
This comes from 50- to 90-year-old vines and is a blend of 79% Cabernet Sauvignon, 11% Cabernet Franc and 10% Merlot with 13.28% alcohol, 3.72 pH and an IPT of 71. The 2017 Léoville Las Cases is deep garnet-purple in colour, and wow, the nose bursts with beautiful blackcurrant cordial, blackberry pie and blueberry preserve notes followed by hints of lilacs, dark chocolate, cedar chest, sassafras and liquorice with emerging wafts of oolong tea, lavender and iron ore.
Medium to full-bodied, the palate is an exercise in elegance and soft-spoken nuances within a mouth-coating palate of almost electric black and blue fruits, framed by very firm, exquisitely ripe, fine-grained tannins and seamless freshness, finishing epically long and wonderfully perfumed. Damn, that’s good.
Drink 2023 - 2070
Lisa Perrotti-Brown MW, Wine Advocate (March 2020)
One of the finest wines of the vintage in Bordeaux, the 2017 Léoville Las Cases is a beautiful Saint-Julien that bursts from the glass with expressive aromas of cassis, wild berries, pencil shavings, violets and a subtle hint of cigar box. Medium to full-bodied, supple and enveloping, its unusually charming, sensual profile largely conceals a considerable endowment of tannin and a bright spine of acidity.
Largely spared by the frost due to its optimal location on the bank of the Gironde and subject to a draconian selection, the 2017's giving style reflects not only the vintage but also the more restrained use of press wine chez Las Cases, seeing only 7% in the blend as opposed to the 10% to 12% that was typical not too long ago. It's a masterpiece.
Drink 2023 - 2065
William Kelley, Wine Advocate (August 2022)
Full bottle 1,339 g.
Tasted blind. Solid but not especially evolved purplish crimson. The densest colour in this blind tasting of top Cabernets and Chinese equivalents. Some ripe and interesting aromas can be coaxed out of this intense liquid. Strong Cabernet aromas. Not especially opulent. Just a little pinched on the end at the moment, but this has a future! Las Cases?
Drink 2026 - 2043
JancisRobinson MW, JancisRobinson.com (August 2023)
The purity here is really something. Blackberries and blackcurrants with sandalwood, mint and other classic herbs. Full-bodied and dense with ultra-fine tannins. Silky in all ways. Goes on for a long, long time. A blend of 79% cabernet sauvignon, 11% cabernet franc and 10% merlot. Joyous and serious wine for the vintage. And comparable to 2014 and 2015.
Try after 2023
James Suckling, JamesSuckling.com (June 2021)
The grand vin 2017 Chateau Leoville Las Cases checks in as 79% Cabernet Sauvignon, 11% Cabernet Franc, and 10% Merlot, harvested between the 15th of September and the 4th of October. Brought up in 90% new French oak, it has an incredibly classic style that carries loads of creme de cassis, crushed rock, graphite, and smoked tobacco-like aromatics. These carry to a full-bodied, concentrated, elegant Las Cases that has fine tannins, flawless balance, and a great finish. It shows the refined, regal style of this estate, has beautiful richness and depth, and is going to drink nicely with just 5-7 years of bottle age.
Drink 2025 - 2047
Jeb Dunnuck, JebDunnuck.com (February 2020)
About this WINE
Chateau Leoville Las Cases
Château Léoville Las Cases is one of the largest and oldest classified growths in the Médoc. It is the largest of the 3 Léoville properties and now without doubt the leading estate in St-Julien.
Léoville Las Cases's 97 hectares of vineyards are superbly sited on gravelly-clay soils with the largest plot being surrounded by a stone wall and stretching between the village of St-Julien and Château Latour. The wine is a Cabernet Sauvignon dominated blend (65%), and is matured in oak barriques (70-80% new) for 18 months.
Léoville Las Cases produces arguably the most exotically perfumed wine in the Médoc and this can be partially attributed to the must being fermented at lower than average temperatures, which leads to its youthful aromatic richness being retained. On the palate it is powerful and concentrated and marvellously well-balanced.
Léoville Las Cases is a 2ème Cru Classé in name but produces 1er Cru Classé quality wines.
St Julien
St Julien is the smallest of the "Big Four" Médoc communes. Although, without any First Growths, St Julien is recognised to be the most consistent of the main communes, with several châteaux turning out impressive wines year after year.
St Julien itself is much more of a village than Pauillac and almost all of the notable properties lie to its south. Its most northerly château is Ch. Léoville Las Cases (whose vineyards actually adjoin those of Latour in Pauillac) but, further south, suitable vineyard land gives way to arable farming and livestock until the Margaux appellation is reached.
The soil is gravelly and finer than that of Pauillac, and without the iron content which gives Pauillac its stature. The homogeneous soils in the vineyards (which extend over a relatively small area of just over 700 hectares) give the commune a unified character.
The wines can be assessed as much by texture as flavour, and there is a sleek, wholesome character to the best. Elegance, harmony and perfect balance and weight, with hints of cassis and cedar, are what epitomise classic St Julien wines. At their very best they combine Margaux’s elegance and refinement with Pauillac’s power and substance.
Ch. Léoville Las Cases produces arguably the most sought-after St Julien, and in any reassessment of the 1855 Classification it would almost certainly warrant being elevated to First Growth status.
Recommended Châteaux: Ch. Léoville Las Cases, Ch.Léoville Barton, Ch Léoville Poyferré, Ch. Ducru-Beaucaillou, Ch Langoa Barton, Ch Gruaud Larose, Ch. Branaire-Ducru, Ch. Beychevelle
Cabernet Sauvignon blend
Cabernet Sauvignon lends itself particularly well in blends with Merlot. This is actually the archetypal Bordeaux blend, though in different proportions in the sub-regions and sometimes topped up with Cabernet Franc, Malbec, and Petit Verdot.
In the Médoc and Graves the percentage of Cabernet Sauvignon in the blend can range from 95% (Mouton-Rothschild) to as low as 40%. It is particularly suited to the dry, warm, free- draining, gravel-rich soils and is responsible for the redolent cassis characteristics as well as the depth of colour, tannic structure and pronounced acidity of Médoc wines. However 100% Cabernet Sauvignon wines can be slightly hollow-tasting in the middle palate and Merlot with its generous, fleshy fruit flavours acts as a perfect foil by filling in this cavity.
In St-Emilion and Pomerol, the blends are Merlot dominated as Cabernet Sauvignon can struggle to ripen there - when it is included, it adds structure and body to the wine. Sassicaia is the most famous Bordeaux blend in Italy and has spawned many imitations, whereby the blend is now firmly established in the New World and particularly in California and Australia.
When is a wine ready to drink?
We provide drinking windows for all our wines. Alongside the drinking windows there is a bottle icon and a maturity stage. Bear in mind that the best time to drink a wine does also depend on your taste.
Not ready
These wines are very young. Whilst they're likely to have lots of intense flavours, their acidity or tannins may make them feel austere. Although it isn't "wrong" to drink these wines now, you are likely to miss out on a lot of complexity by not waiting for them to mature.
Ready - youthful
These wines are likely to have plenty of fruit flavours still and, for red wines, the tannins may well be quite noticeable. For those who prefer younger, fruitier wines, or if serving alongside a robust meal, these will be very enjoyable. If you choose to hold onto these wines, the fruit flavours will evolve into more savoury complexity.
Ready - at best
These wines are likely to have a beautiful balance of fruit, spice and savoury flavours. The acidity and tannins will have softened somewhat, and the wines will show plenty of complexity. For many, this is seen as the ideal time to drink and enjoy these wines. If you choose to hold onto these wines, they will become more savoury but not necessarily more complex.
Ready - mature
These wines are likely to have plenty of complexity, but the fruit flavours will have been almost completely replaced by savoury and spice notes. These wines may have a beautiful texture at this stage of maturity. There is lots to enjoy when drinking wines at this stage. Most of these wines will hold in this window for a few years, though at the very end of this drinking window, wines start to lose complexity and decline.
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Description
One of the finest wines of the vintage in Bordeaux, the 2017 Léoville Las Cases is a beautiful Saint-Julien that bursts from the glass with expressive aromas of cassis, wild berries, pencil shavings, violets and a subtle hint of cigar box. Medium to full-bodied, supple and enveloping, its unusually charming, sensual profile largely conceals a considerable endowment of tannin and a bright spine of acidity.
Largely spared by the frost due to its optimal location on the bank of the Gironde and subject to a draconian selection, the 2017's giving style reflects not only the vintage but also the more restrained use of press wine chez Las Cases, seeing only 7% in the blend as opposed to the 10% to 12% that was typical not too long ago. It's a masterpiece.
Drink 2023 - 2065
William Kelley, Wine Advocate (August 2022)
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