The 2012 classification was particularly controversial, and I suspect that 2022 will be equally so.
Apart from the group of Premier Cru Classe A, I don’t think even the most ardent Bordeaux fan pays too much attention to it, except the owners whose land values are pegged to their classification.
I think it has become fairly obvious that Figeac will be pushing for promotion, after their failure to get one in 2012 led to the ousting of the owner’s son in law. Since then, the wines have become more modern, but I am happy to say after a vertical recently, the wines have still got the Figeac signature. I may prefer some of, but not all, the older wines, but the property has not been ruined under the new regime.
The other likely candidate is Belair Monange, but I think it needs more time. And personally, I am not a fan, especially when you think we lost Magdelaine for this new estate, which is now producing slightly anonymous wines.
I refer to your site at least on a weekly basis, to be completely honest. Big fan of it and often use it to help me work out if I’m buying something I’d like or not.
Not a big fan of some of the walls of text, though, such as your link there about digging out the classification info. Now that I’m aware of the existence, though, it’ll be read tonight! (This is a personal flaw - attention to detail and attention span never were my greatest qualities)
This differs from the 1855 classification which was supposed to be a down and dirty response to a request for the World Fair. Because it’s importance grew organically, to all intents and purposes it became based on brand rather than terroir. Plenty of examples of changes not impacting position. In addition, with the exception of a couple of changes, it has remained unaltered for 165 years.
Saint Emilion used an entirely different blueprint. They review every ten years, any changes in land holdings are subject to approval, and as I mentioned, despite all the legal wranglings, it is largely irrelevant to anybody but the owners.
In addition to what you can and can’t alter, the committees taste extensively and look at pricing. And frankly, the 2012 one was almost a perfect correlation to Parker scoring; ironic when you consider Parker’s influence was starting to wane. But the scores did influence pricing, so the results were not altogether surprising.
Glad to you have as a reader and follower. Yes, the article is long. But we have tried breaking the text up with small paragraphs of not more than 3-4-5 sentences and use bolded, sub-headings as much as possible.
When you read the articles about chateaux and vineyards, do you use the contents bar or tabs menus? They should instantly move you to where you want to be on the page.
To be honest, I generally use the search function. Being able to type in ‘ausone’ and immediately see the list of scores (e.g. https://www.thewinecellarinsider.com/search-wine-tasting-notes/?szSearch=ausone ) rather than having to scroll to see it is useful. Not saying the scores are the be all and end all, but if I’m considering a purchase, knowing the (rough) score will help me decide if I’m interested in further reading about the vintage or not.
My typical journey is a wine lookup, sometimes I look up Bordeaux by vintage aggregate, and sometimes I’m looking up Rhones to see your opinions on various chateauneufs or hermitages (for example).
FWIW we’ve interacted on things like Cellartracker before, this isnt our first time!
That is the tasting note search. All those queries are tasting notes. You might want to look at the article search. If you enter a winery name, you will find a lot more functionality on those pages. Just a suggestion. Hope it helps
I will repeat here my sentiments about the gentleman that I posted on the other board. Last word on the subject from me, not worth expending any more energy.
I think one needs to make allowances for all the brain cells which have been lost or retired in extreme old age. His particular ones seem to have done a massive exodus leaving him with some pretty stupid ideas and a third rate ability to insult people.
I like my trolls a lot more intelligent and articulate and less befuddled than this guy.
To Otto Forsberg: I will try to do that, now.
To Mark Golodetz: I disagree with you a lot, and I suggest you read my post of 4/15/21 at 8:31am under “What happened to Robert Parker? The State of Wine Criticism
in 2018.”
RTPL
I feel like there are two parallel threads in this one thread. One is about the classification of Bordeaux, how to buy highly allocated wines, inks to more info; the other one, not so much.
. I’m not sure which.