2019 Clos Les Lunelles
Estimated value
Buying options
Tasting notes
Coming from the incredible team at Pavie, the 2019 Clos Lunelles boasts a big, ripe, incredibly sexy and mouth-filling style as well as notes of black plums, black cherries, tobacco, and Asian spices. It brings serious fruit and opulence and is full-bodied, has a round, expansive mouthfeel, sweet tannins, and some obvious underlying minerality. It's already drinking beautifully and should deliver the goods over the coming 10-15 years. While it leads with its fruit, I expect it to show more classic limestone character as it sheds some baby fat.
Critic scores
Average Score
James Lawther MW, jancisrobinson.com
Neal Martin
More reviews and scores
The Perse family's Côtes de Castillon property, located on the clay-limestone soils typical of this appellation, has produced a serious, structured wine in the 2019 Clos Lunelles. Exhibiting aortas of sweet berry fruit, exotic spices and creamy new oak, it's medium to full-bodied, taut and concentrated, with tangy acids and plenty of powdery tannin.
The 2019 Clos Lunelles seems to have clammed up on the nose. It was marked by its intensity from barrel, but the strictness that I noted then is more accentuated and you have to eke out the blackberry, blueberry and incense aromas. The palate is medium-bodied with pliant tannins and well-judged acidity. Smooth and silky in texture, this has cohered nicely during its barrel maturation, yet it retains some muscle on the finish. This is a fine Castillon Côtes de Bordeaux, but as I mentioned before, it will require 4–5 years of bottle age.
The 2019 Clos Lunelles is refined and classy from start to finish. Crushed purplish berry fruit, lavender, spice, mint and a kiss of French oak are all laced together in a mid-weight, silky Côtes de Castillon that impresses with its silkiness and balance.