Château Haut-Bages Libéral 2018

The 2018 vintage in Pauillac

Vintage benchmark: 95/100 (appellation benchmark, not a score for this wine)

Vintage character: After a spring marked by mildew, the heat concentrated a small crop: rich, ripe wines with great depth of material.

Overall reading of the year’s season across Pauillac. An estate can depart from it sharply, in frost or hail years, where two neighbours did not make the same vintage. What this particular wine actually gave is on its technical sheet and in the scores above.

Tasting

The comparison between vintages brings us immediately to great references... 2009 for the richness and roundness with its solar temperament; 2016 for the power and smoothness of the tannic frame and the remarkable ageing potential. A vintage at the crossroads of the best of both worlds: a precise blend of classicism and generosity.

The vintage

2018 is a vintage that will certainly mark the spirits... On the one hand because it was very difficult to be born. A humid spring and an exceptional pressure of fungal diseases were followed by a summer with extreme sunshine conditions. Certain areas of the Margaux appellation and more generally the South of the Médoc were favored by a few thunderstorms during the summer which allowed to reduce the impact of the water stress.

The musts with complicated fermentation potentials (high degrees, malic acid in low concentration) ended up keeping the technical teams under pressure until the end of the winemaking process. In addition, the quality of the wines produced has a character and a quite remarkable sweetness. From the first days of vinification, the vats perfumed the cellars with a generous and intense fragrance, letting the musts with a juicy and round characters. At the end of the maceration, our feelings were confirmed when the tastings revealed powerful and concentrated wines. The levels of acidity remained moderate despite their high levels. This acidity allowed the wines to keep a surprising freshness. On the aromatic level, the wines are expressive and precise, the palate is both powerful and silky.

Blend of the 2018 vintage

Figures from the 2018 sheet

• 35 yrsVine age

Winemaking

Traditional, in concrete and stainless steel tanks. Plot selection. Fermentation on skins: 19 to 22 days.

Ageing

In French oak barrels during 16 months. 40% of new oak.

Terroir

The vineyard covers 30 hectares, half of which are located around the property, adjoining Château Latour. The other part of the vineyard is on the Bages plateau, in the south of Pauillac. The estate's plots are located in 2 areas, one made up of deep gravels and the other of clay-limestone and chalky limestone. This type of soil gives the wine its power and its mineral character. A large part of its fine deep-gravel land overlooks the Gironde estuary. These gravels were carried down by the river from the Pyrenees during the Quaternary era. They rest on a limestone bedrock.