1989 | Château Léoville-Las Cases | Grand Vin de Leoville

Fully mature, medium bodied wine, blending classic character with elegance and austerity, the wine has a cassis, sweet and tart cherry, cedar, tobacco and hint of green in its character. The tannins are softened making the wine fun to drink, but the short finish and lack of depth stop the score from going higher.

Reviews:

• Wine Advocate: The 1989 tasted California-like in its ripe, sweet, black cherry fruit, nicely-integrated, toasty new oak, and clean, pure winemaking style. A tighter, more compact finish is the result of elevated tannin, but this is an outstanding, rich, medium-weight Las Cases that tastes less well-endowed than I originally predicted. It is built more along the lines of the classy, elegant 1985 than the blockbuster 1982 and 1986. The wine is still youthful, with no amber at the edge of its healthy deep ruby/purple color. It will improve for another 8-12 years, and then plateau, offering very fine drinking over the subsequent two decades. I overrated this wine from cask. As appealing as I still find it, it lacks the concentration and intensity I originally thought it possessed.

• James Suckling: Very ripe, with raisin and dried fruits on the nose. You can smell the sun-dried grapes. Full-bodied, delivering firm tannins and a very fresh palate. Long and flavorful, offering currant, berries and all sorts of dark fruits, but turns lightly earthy and floral. This is a thoroughly complex wine. Just starting to really open into the mature 20-year-old wine it is, but such a great life ahead of it. Muscular.

Producer Information

Château Léoville-Las Cases is an estate in the Saint-Julien appellation of Bordeaux, ranked as a second growth in the 1855 Classification of the Médoc and Graves. Typical of the appellation, Château Léoville-Las Cases is Cabernet Sauvignon-dominant, with smaller amounts of Merlot and Cabernet Franc. The estate has a history dating back to the mid-17th Century, when it used to be part of a much larger estate. During the French Revolution (1789-1799) the estate was divided in two with a small section becoming Château Léoville Barton. In 1840, the original estate was again divided, creating Château Léoville-Poyferre. All three of the Léoville châteaux were named in the 1855 Classification as second growths, but Léoville-Las Cases remains the largest. There are 98 hectares (242 acres) of vineyards, planted with 66 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, 24 percent Merlot, 9 percent Cabernet Franc and 1 percent Petit Verdot. The vineyard's soils are mostly gravel over sand and clay, with some areas where the clay reaches the surface. The proximity of the Gironde moderates weather extremes, lowering the risk of frost and allowing grapes to ripen earlier than vineyards further inland. The vines are on average 40 years old. Léoville-Las Cases produces three wines, all red Bordeaux blends. It is credited with being one of the first Bordeaux producers to release a second wine in 1902, even though the second wine in question, the Clos du Marquis, is made from a separate vineyard and thus is not really a second wine. A true second wine, Le Petit Lion du Marquis de Las Cases, was released in 2007, and is a Merlot-dominant wine made from younger vines, which are not yet ready for the grand vin. Domaines Delon, proprietors of the estate, also own Château Potensac in the Medoc and Château Nénin in Pomerol.

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