Lea & Sandeman Wine Merchants

POMMARD

2015 1er Cru Clos des Épeneaux Domaine Comte Armand

Grapes Pinot Noir
Colour Red
Origin France, Burgundy
District Côte d'Or
Sub-district Côte de Beaune
Village Pommard
Classification 1er Cru
ABV 14%
Vineyard Clos des Épeneaux

Tiny yields here following hail - 15hl/ha, and even worse in 2016, with 13/hl/ha thanks to frost. Deep colour, very blue-purple to black. Aromatic nose of juicy crushed black berries, and palate is a joy of this very dark flavour, rich and persistent, completely gorgeous fruit and a lively balance and length. This is top stuff - really elegant as well as powerful. Terrific. Drinking range: 2024 - L&S (Nov 2016)


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The 2015 Pommard Clos des Epeneaux 1er Cru takes time to coalesce in the glass, eventually revealing black cherries, raspberries, autumn leaves and a touch of incense. It is understated and classic in style, but seems to grow with aeration. The crisp palate is medium-bodied with fine-grained tannin and plenty of tension – a bit linear and strict at the moment, though I suspect this will age with real style once it has gotten through its adolescence. Do not touch for 5 to 7 years. Tasted blind at the annual Burgfest tasting. Drinking range: 2023 - 2045 Rating: 92 Neal Martin, www.vinous.com (Nov 2018)

(the 5+ ha Clos is composed of approximately 80% Petits Epenots and 20% Grands Epenots; the vine ages run from 18 to 75+ years of age). Here the nose is notably riper than the 2016 version yet it manages to retain good freshness to the pure red berry fruit, earthy, floral and spice-suffused aromas. The decidedly dense, tautly muscular and powerful broad-shouldered flavors are underpinned by notably firm tannins and outstanding length on the beautifully complex finale that exhibits just enough warmth to warrant mentioning. This is quite clearly built-to-age and it’s going to need it. In a word, impressive. Drinking range: 2030 - Rating: 94 Allen Meadows, www.Burghound.com (Apr 2018)

(bottled at the end of May 2017; vinified with 15% whole clusters and aged in 30% new oak): Healthy dark red. Less dark on the nose than this wine appeared to be in November of 2016, with its redcurrant and cherry aromas complicated by menthol and flinty minerality. At once silky and energetic on entry, offering thick yet brisk flavors of acidulated small red fruits, spices and minerals. This highly concentrated wine finishes with substantial ripe tannins, saturating the entire palate and building slowly on the aftertaste. Zinetti did a gentler extraction in 2015 but this wine should still last for a long time. It may well merit an even higher score ten years or so down the road. Rating: 93+ Stephen Tanzer, www.vinousmedia.com (Jan 2018)

Domaine Comte Armand

A domaine totalling nine hectares, of which the most important part is a magnificent five hectare monopole of the Pommard Premier Cru Clos des Epeneaux, which was put together by Nicolas Marey in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (along with the DRC Romanée Saint Vivant 'Marey-Monge'). These vineyards were all sold, except for the Clos (it now been enclosed by a wall), which came to Jean-François Armand as a dowry when he married Nicolas' daughter in 1826. The Volnay vineyards were added in 1994, followed by parcels in Auxey Duresses.

The current Comte Armand is a lawyer living in Paris, but very supportive of the régisseurs who have looked after this domaine for the thirty years or so that L&S have been buying here. The 1980 vintage, made by one of the many Rossignols of Volnay who was in charge at the time, was for us a great introduction to the possibilities of the great Clos des Epeneaux vineyard. Then came the era of Pascal Marchand, a young Quebecois who came to do a harvest with Domaine Bruno Clair and just never left. He began a period of radical restructuring and the introduction of organic and then biodynamic farming, while making very dark, dense and long-lived wines. Benjamin Leroux, hugely respected amongst growers who approach things from an organic or biodynamic point of view, then took over, and refined this approach and changed the way the parcels of vines are divided up for harvesting, paying less attention to just the age of the vines, and more to the underlying soil types. Claude Bourguignon was employed to provide a full geological survey of the Clos as the basis for this. Under Benjamin the wines of the Clos gained in finesse and precision, while still having the depth and richness expected of a great Pommard.

Both Pascal and Benjamin were keen to expand beyond the confines of the Clos, and the Domaine also has vines in Volnay, and, a particular enthusiasm of both Pascal and Benjamin, in Auxey Duresses, where they are convinced of the great potential of some of this village's undervalued and neglected terroirs. Paul Zinetti, who had worked with Ben for four years, took over in 2014.

The vineyard is cultivated organically (ECOCERT certified) and biodynamically. The grapes are entirely de-stemmed, but left intact, for a five to eight-day cold maceration before the fermentation, which lasts five to ten days, and then the wine remains in the fermenters for between three and fifteen days, depending on the vintage. In most years, the total time with skin contact will be around four weeks, which is longer than most. The wines will then be aged in barrel for between eighteen and twenty-four months, with new wood limited to 30% for the wine from the old vines of the Clos, down to none at all for the village wines.

Paul said from the outset that he wanted to make to make a less tannic wine in the Clos, and one which is more about aromatic length. In this he is continuing the route that Ben was following, but perhaps taking it even further.

This wine isn't currently part of a mixed case, but you can always browse our full selection of mixed cases here.
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