CHÂTEAU CLERC MILON
2015 5ème Cru Classé Pauillac
Great breadth to the expansive black fruit here. Supple and ripe in a very easy, plummy way. This is expressive, spicy, full of interest, yet easy to hold in the mouth and explore. Rather a delight, and long too. Close to the best vintage of Clerc Milon I have ever tasted, quality near 2010, but a different style. Philippe Dhallouin was clearly delighted with it and said that sometimes all the little things - the ten year replanting and vineyard restructuring, the changes to viticulture, the new chai, lots and lots of little changes, sometimes seem to pay back all at once, and he feels that this is the case here. Rating: 92-93 L&S (Apr 2016)
* This is a pre-shipment/primeur offer. All orders are accepted under the TERMS of this offer which differ from the terms of the rest of the site.
The 2015 Clerc Milon has a loose-knit bouquet featuring mainly red fruit. It's slightly herbaceous and earthy in style and not really exuding Pauillac typicity. The palate is medium-bodied and fleshy, with pliant tannins and bright acidity, although overall it misses some complexity, especially toward the finish. Tasted blind at the 2015 Bordeaux Ten-Year-On tasting at Farr Vintners. Drinking range: 2026 - 2036 Rating: 90 Neal Martin, www.vinous.com (Jun 2025)
Inky depths to the colour, gunsmoke aromatics, sweet blackberry, damson and bilberry fruit. Muscular tannins holding everything in place but you can clearly see the development ahead, with its concentrated cocoa bean, espresso, toasted cherry pit and rosemary on the finish. Great stuff. Harvest September 17 to October 6, Jean-Emmanuel Danjoy technical director, 50% new oak. Drinking range: 2025 - 2040 Rating: 94 Jane Anson, Decanter (Nov 2022)
The 2015 Clerc-Milon has a lively, fresh bouquet with more red than black fruit, offering wild strawberry, red cherries and bergamot aromas laced with cedar. The lightly spiced palate is medium-bodied with grainy tannin; more black fruit surfaces here. Well-balanced and focused, though I would like more substance and grip on the finish. This showed much better a year ago, so it may be entering a dumb phase. Tasted blind at the Southwold 2015 Bordeaux tasting. Rating: 90 Neal Martin, www.vinous.com (Jul 2019)
Extremely floral with blackberry and blueberry character plus hints of violets. Full-bodied yet always in check and reserve with fine tannins and bright acidity that goes on for minutes. Limestone undertones. The finish is particularly long this vintage. Super Clerc. Drinking range: 2021 - Rating: 95 James Suckling, www.jamessuckling.com (Feb 2018)
Inky blue/purplish fruit, lavender, spice and licorice, along with the natural generosity of the vintage, give the 2015 Clerc-Milon is plush, sumptuous personality. Although not especially complex or nuanced, the 2015 offers plenty of raciness in an accessible, fleshy style that can be enjoyed with minimal fuss. From barrel, the 2015 gave the impression of being quite structured, but the bottled wine is far more forthcoming at this early stage. The blend is 51% Cabernet Sauvignon, 34% Merlot, 13% Cabernet Franc, 1% Petit Verdot and 1% Carmenère. Drinking range: 2020 - 2035 Rating: 92 Antonio Galloni, www.vinous.com (Feb 2018)
Smooth, rich and well upholstered, this is typical of the wines from the Mouton stable, especially now that the new cellar is in action. It’s a ripe, textured, sweetly oaked style that nods towards the New World as much as the Gironde, and is skilfully done. Drinking range: 2020 - 2028 Rating: 92 Tim Atkin MW, www.timatkin.com (May 2016)
This is 51% Cabernet Sauvignon, 34% Merlot, 13% Cabernet Franc, and 1% each Petit Verdot and Carmenère. A quite bright, perfumed, direct style here, with fresh black fruit, powdered cherry and taut, just-ripe blackcurrant, with a slightly leafy freshness to it. The palate is very pure, with tense blackberry and blackcurrant fruit, with a rather taut, slightly leafy edge to it like the nose and a little dusty pepper. Very cool in style, with a sappy acid backbone, perhaps exaggerating the definition of the tannins a little bit. These are ripe, and give some rather firm grip. Rather open and juicy in the finish, with a lot of structure coming through here. Tasted twice. Rating: 15-16/20 Chris Kissack, www.thewinedoctor.com (Apr 2016)
51% Cabernet Sauvignon, 34% Merlot, 13% Cabernet Franc, 1% Petit Verdot, 1% Carmenère. Picked 17 Sep - 6 Oct. Rather broader and riper than Armailhac, presumably thanks to the lower Cabernet quotient. But still very fresh, almost inky. Dry finish. 'New fashioned.' Super-appetising. Very long. Drinking range: 2024 - 2040 Rating: 17.5 Jancis Robinson OBE MW - www.JancisRobinson.com (Apr 2016)
Fuller than its stablemate d’Armailhac, showing more black fruits and a broader palate, but the same silky richness is there – a hallmark of big brother Mouton. Has great depth for the future. Drinking range: 2022 - 2040Steven Spurrier (Apr 2016)
The 2015 Clerc Milon is a blend of 51% Cabernet Sauvignon, 34% Merlot, 13% Cabernet Franc, and 1% each of Petit Verdot and Carmenère, raised in 55% new oak. It has a highly perfumed bouquet with scents of small black cherries, graphite, touches of incense and wilted violets. This is a very extravagant bouquet for Clerc-Milon that wants to make an early impression. The palate is medium-bodied with fine-grain tannin, more expressive and delineated than the 2015 d'Armailhac, the finish beautifully focused with that graphite seam coming through on the sustained finish. This is potentially an outstanding Clerc-Milon, though it will need a decade in bottle to show its true potential. Drinking range: 2023 - 2045 Rating: 91-93 Neal Martin, www.vinous.com (Apr 2016)
The 2015 Clerc Milon is plush, round and inviting, with a gorgeous center of fruit, striking aromatics and balance. The tannins are especially silky, which gives the 2015 much of its succulence and inviting personality. Hints of mocha, dark spices and violets add further shades of nuance and gravitas in a Clerc Milon endowed with real depth, density and gravitas. Patience will be key, as the 2015 is likely to require at least a few years to fully come together. This is a very pretty, rewarding Clerc Milon. Rating: 91-93 Antonio Galloni, www.vinous.com (Apr 2016)
This is super fine textured with ultra-polished tannins. Full body, blackberry, blueberry and dark chocolate. Long and refined. Rating: 94-95 James Suckling, www.jamessuckling.com (Apr 2016)
Offers a rounded, juicy feel, with cherry and black currant fruit moving along, backed by sweet tobacco notes and a flicker of anise. Pure and fresh. Rating: 89—92 James Molesworth, The Wine Spectator (Apr 2016)
Château Clerc Milon
Pauillac Cinquième cru 1855 The tiny village of Milon is in the far north of the Pauillac commune and lends its name to Château Duhart-Milon. Château Clerc Milon is a kilometre away to the east, the other side of Château Lafite-Rothschild in the village of Mousset but, for some reason, also adopted the name of Milon. The Clerc comes from Jean-Baptiste Clerc who owned the château at the time of the 1855 classification when it was accorded 5th Growth status - a status that the Rothschilds (of Mouton, who bought the run-down estate in 1970) have striven hard to exceed. As far as neighbours go, they don't come more impressive than Clerc Milon's - the vineyards adjoin both those of Château Lafite-Rothschild and Château Mouton Rothschild. That's quite a lot to compete with! The vineyards are planted to around 45% Cabernet Sauvignon, a proportion that has slowly been reduced over the years in favour of Merlot (40%). There is just over 10% Cabernet Franc, a little Petit Verdot and, very unusually for Bordeaux these days, a small amount of Carmenere. The label shows an ornate pair of jewelled dancing clowns that are part of the art collection at Mouton Rothschild.
Please make sure that you have read the terms of this offer which are different from those of the main website. If you are unclear as to what is involved in primeur purchases please do call us, but see the 'practical notes' below.
Ordering
Prices are per case as listed 'in bond London'.
Pre-Orders are a firm commitment from you to buy the wines you order on release, subject to the price being below the upper price of the estimated band on our website. You may also set your own upper price limit, lower or higher than ours. Pre-orders will be fulfilled subject to availability. Providing this firm commitment to us effectively gives you priority.
Wines listed on the website (after any pre-orders and allocations have been fulfilled) can be ordered in the usual way via the website order form or by email or telephone 020 7221 1982, always subject to stock remaining.
Confirmation
All orders will be confirmed by email and are contractually binding unless written cancellation is received within seven days of the confirmation date, apart from pre-orders which are binding if the release price is below the top estimate or other price you have set.
Invoices are raised at the In Bond price, excluding any duty and VAT which will become payable at the prevailing rates on arrival of the wine if required duty paid.
Payment is required on sight of invoice, by cash, cheque, debit card or credit transfer. We reserve the right to charge 2% per month on invoices unpaid after 30 days.
Delivery
- Shipment to our bond (LCB Creek Road) and insurance are included in the in bond price.
- Delivery is free to Lea and Sandeman / Elephant storage accounts, both duty paid and in bond.
- Other deliveries (In Bond and Duty Paid) are also free subject to a minimum order from the offer of £1000, orders below this total will be charged £16.50+ VAT when the wine invoices are issued. We will group deliveries and this is a charge for your entire purchases, not a per-case charge.
- Delivery for 2016 Bordeaux primeurs will probably be completed by October 2019, but we make no guarantee as to specific delivery times, and some of the Sauternes may be later.
Practical notes - how it works
We start a sale in each customer's name and add all their primeur orders to one sale which is invoiced at the end of the campaign (or when the customer wishes) for immediate payment. We and our customers find that having a single invoice for the vintage is the simpler option, but do please note that confirmed orders are still binding as above even if the final invoice has not been issued.
When the wine is shipped, unless previously specified we will assume that delivery is to be to bonded storage with Elephant Storage, but in any case, we will contact you requesting any alternative instructions. If you have another bonded delivery address you would like the wine to go to, please tell us at the time of ordering. If the wines are required duty-paid we will issue invoices at the rates prevailing at the time for the excise duty (currently £25.98 per case) and the VAT (currently at 20%) on the total of the wine cost and the duty.
Half-bottles, Magnums and larger bottles.
One of the additional advantages of buying en primeur is being able to order the wine in the bottle size you want. Even if a wine is only listed in one size, you can order any bottle or case size you want if the property supplies it, but you must order the case/bottle size you require and check that the correct size has been invoiced.
Additional charges are as follows:-
- +£15 per case of 24 half-bottles
- +£15 per case of 6 Magnums (2 bottles equivalent, 1.5 litres each)
- +£35 per individually boxed Double Magnum (4 bottles equivalent, 3 litres)
- +£45 per individually boxed Imperial (8 bottles equivalent, 6 litres) for Salmanazars, Balthazars, Nebuchadnezzars and Melchiors please enquire for availability and price.