2023 Clos Fourtet, St Emilion, Bordeaux
Critics reviews
Aged in 2% amphora, 45% new oak, with berries destemmed but uncrushed before fermenting. Stephane Derenoncourt consultant.
It starts right out of the gate with fragrant white flowers, lime zest freshness, scraping pumice stone limestone feel, strong Clos Fourtet character coming through, with cassis and black cherry fruits, a whirl of peony and iris flowers, inching forward step by step through the palate.
Drink 2030 - 2045
Jane Anson, Inside Bordeaux (April 2024)
The 2023 Clos Fourtet was picked from September 14 to October 3 and aged in 40% new oak.
The nose is very attractive and quite sensual in style with red cherries, crushed strawberries and incense. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannins, fresh, focused, pure and quite linear on the finish. This is much more classically styled than the 2022, and it conveys tenderness and persistence. Superb.
Drink 2027 - 2047
Neal Martin, Vinous.com (April 2024)
Tasted two times
The 2023 Clos Fourtet is pure class. Elegant and soaring, it offers an exciting mélange of dark-toned fruit, leather, incense, dried herbs, pencil shavings, and crushed rocks. Beams of supporting limestone-infused tannin and acid give Clos Fourtet a super-distinctive feel. The long, enduring finish is a thing of beauty. Clos Fourtet remains a benchmark example of wines from Saint-Émilion’s famed limestone plateau.
Drink 2030 - 2063
Antonio Galloni, Vinous.com (April 2024)
The 2023 Clos Fourtet is especially suave and refined this year, wafting from the glass with deep aromas of red berries, liquorice, violets and pencil shavings, framed by a nicely integrated patina of new oak. Medium to full-bodied, supple and layered, with a velvety attack that segues into a bright, precise mid-palate, it's pure and lively, concluding with a mineral finish.
William Kelley, Wine Advocate (April 2024)
87% Merlot, 7% Cabernet Franc and 6% Cabernet Sauvignon. Cask sample.
Aromatically complex and enticing. Layered fruit on the palate with a firm but refined tannic frame. Juicy and fresh with a marked chalky character. Some potential. A success for the vintage.
Drink 2030 - 2048
James Lawther MW, JancisRobinson.com (May 2024)
This is so full of energy. It’s full-bodied with electrified tannins and a long, long finish. So polish and focus here with exquisite balance and length.
James Suckling, JamesSuckling.com (May 2024)
Ageing 20% new oak, and after one and two-year barrels.
Ripe and sweet damsons on the nose, dark fruit and some floral reflections - quite an expressive nose. Supple and agile, a nice energy to this and lovely succulence of cool blue fruit with some ripe red cherries. Really juicy but not lean or too high in acidity. Easy to enjoy. lifted, fresh, no rough edges. No harshness, all balanced and harmonious. A light but enjoyable glass. 15% of the massale selection Cabernet Franc went into this blend, with some grapes on the limestone plateau making their wine into this second wine for the first time.
Drink 2026 - 2036
Georgina Hindle, Decanter.com (April 2024)
Checking in as 87% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc, and 7% Cabernet Sauvignon, raised in 50-60% new oak, the 2023 Clos Fourtet has a beautiful limestone-driven style in its red and blue fruits as well as floral and chalky nuances that emerge with time in the glass. Medium-bodied, incredibly well-balanced, and elegant on the palate, it has fine tannins and outstanding length, as well as a gorgeous limestone character. It’s a beautiful wine from this family estate that readers will love to have in their cellars.
Jeb Dunnuck, JebDunnuck.com (May 2024)
About this WINE
Clos Fourtet
Château Clos Fourtet is a St. Emilion 1er Grand Cru Classé property located just outside the entrance to the town. It is distinguished by its beautiful ivy-covered manor house and some of the most extensive underground cellars in the region.
Clos Fourtet has had several owners over the years and underwent a mini-renaissance under the stewardship of the Lurtons in the latter half of the last century. Pierre Lurton was the winemaker who really established the property`s reputation as one of the finest on the St. Martin plateau. He left to become winemaker at Cheval Blanc and was replaced by Daniel Alard. In January 2001, Clos Fourtet was bought by Paris businessman Phillipe Cuvelier.
Clos Fourtet has 19 hectares of vineyards planted with Merlot (72%), Cabernet Franc (22%) and Cabernet Sauvignon (6%). The wine is vinified traditionally and is aged in oak barriques (60-70% new) for 18 months. It is bottled unfiltered.
St Émilion
St Émilion is one of Bordeaux's largest producing appellations, producing more wine than Listrac, Moulis, St Estèphe, Pauillac, St Julien and Margaux put together. St Emilion has been producing wine for longer than the Médoc but its lack of accessibility to Bordeaux's port and market-restricted exports to mainland Europe meant the region initially did not enjoy the commercial success that funded the great châteaux of the Left Bank.
St Émilion itself is the prettiest of Bordeaux's wine towns, perched on top of the steep limestone slopes upon which many of the region's finest vineyards are situated. However, more than half of the appellation's vineyards lie on the plain between the town and the Dordogne River on sandy, alluvial soils with a sprinkling of gravel.
Further diversity is added by a small, complex gravel bed to the north-east of the region on the border with Pomerol. Atypically for St Émilion, this allows Cabernet Franc and, to a lesser extent, Cabernet Sauvignon to prosper and defines the personality of the great wines such as Ch. Cheval Blanc.
In the early 1990s there was an explosion of experimentation and evolution, leading to the rise of the garagistes, producers of deeply-concentrated wines made in very small quantities and offered at high prices. The appellation is also surrounded by four satellite appellations, Montagne, Lussac, Puisseguin and St. Georges, which enjoy a family similarity but not the complexity of the best wines.
St Émilion was first officially classified in 1954, and is the most meritocratic classification system in Bordeaux, as it is regularly amended. The most recent revision of the classification was in 2012
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.
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Description
Blend: 6% Cabernet Sauvignon; 87% Merlot; 7% Cabernet Franc.
Clos Fourtet’s quality has increased since the Cuvelier family took over in 2001, and latterly under Mathieu Cuvelier. We are delighted to work with the property from the limestone côtes of St Emilion. The vineyards here are never more than 1m from limestone and sit on an astonishing 13 hectares of underground caves. The wine is always aromatic, and this year, it has fascinating iodine, lavender, and dog rose notes. On the palate, the Cabernets bring the lush Merlot into line before the limestone adds a crisp, mineral closure.
Drink 2029 - 2050
Our score: 18/20
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