Bordeaux 2023 Vintage Report: Keeping Up With the Classics

The 2023 vintage in Bordeaux is a year not to overlook, even if it has been overshadowed by an extraordinary year like 2022. The best wines have a quality and character that remind me of great bygone years such as 1982 and 1989 – vintages that were benchmarks for me when I was establishing my career as a wine critic and Bordeaux specialist.

“It is like the years of the 1980s where you have a certain density and freshness,” said Jean-Philippe Delmas, the longtime technical director of the revered estates of Haut-Brion and La Mission Haut-Brion. “It is a modern example of the year of 1980s. I love the balance and the energy in the 2023. You say ‘wow’ when you taste it and you say ‘I love to drink this.’”

The top wines of 2023, especially in Pomerol and St-Emilion, show warm, ripe fruit and then a firm, fresh finish. The best have dense, compact center palates. They are what the French call classic Bordeaux, with length and intensity delivered in a balanced and subtle way. They are very different from the opulent and powerful reds of 2022, when extreme heat and drought produced extraordinarily rich, flamboyant wines reminiscent of such reputed vintages as 1928, 1947, 1982 and 2009.

“The 2022 was so outside of the box that it has an unjust influence on the way people see 2023,” said Thomas Burke, the development and commercial manager of Chateau Margaux, the famous first growth that made a gorgeous and structured 2023. “People come here and they think about 2022 when they are tasting the 2023. You need to judge 2023 on its own.”

Added Veronique Ducasse, the general manager of Chateau Phelan Segur, who wanted to emphasize that 2023 shows the character of her vineyard instead of simply the vintage like 2022 did: “2023 is what we are at Phelan Segur. It is excellent quality. It is fresher and more balanced character than 2022, which was the exception and not the norm. The 2022s are very different than what we make in Bordeaux normally.”

I couldn’t agree more, especially after tasting and rating nearly 1,600 wines from the vintage with my team, both in our offices in Hong Kong and in Bordeaux. That is why I compare 2023 to more classic years that are less marked by outright hot and dry growing seasons. Granted, the statistics for 2023 are close to 2022 in terms of heat and sunlight during the growing season, but the much larger crop in 2023 and rain later in the season gave a very different result.

The high-quality 2023 reds have ripe fruit, but they are also harmonious, precise and defined. They are about refinement and finesse, with structure and richness. It helped that most 2023s came in at about one degree of alcohol lower than the same wines in 2022, with strong natural acidity and lower pH.

“The 2023 is about ripeness, like the 2022, but it’s not the same thing,” said Gonzague Lurton, the owner and winemaker at Durfort-Vivens. He and his wife also control other respected properties such as Haut-Bages Liberal and Ferriere. Their viticulture is biodynamic and their winemaking hands-on with low sulfur.

“The 2022 was richer and more structured,” he continued. “The 2023 is softer and juicier with so much charm. It’s more accessible. It is really the style of the year. We didn’t change our winemaking in 2023 from 2022. We worked hard to have more balance and not overextract. They are wines of charm. It was the vintage that gave us that.”

This balance and clarity across the wines, including reds, dry whites and sweet wines also made it easier to see the true character of each one, highlighting provenance in aroma, flavor and structure. It was a terroir-driven vintage, where regions, microclimates and vineyards come through clearly in the best wines.

“We always said the 2023 was a terroir-driven vintage and the terroir of every vineyard shows its real character,” said Edouard Moueix, whose family are negociants as well as owners of such illustrious Right Bank names as La Fleur-Petrus, Trotanoy and Belair-Monange. “It’s very clear.”

Added Carole Andre, the cellarmaster at Cheval Blanc: “All the plots had a singularity in their expression. You could recognize the plots and their soils and their varieties in the 2023s. It was very easy for the technical team. We had a precise expression of every parcel.

“In 2022, the weather made the character of the wines,” she continued. “In 2023, it was the opposite. 2023 was the mirror of the terroir. 2022 was the mirror of the climate.”

Some winemakers and owners attributed the success of 2023 to the hot weather at the end of the growing season, including two heat spikes, followed by cooler, slightly wet weather at the end of September during harvest.

“We didn’t have a problem with the rain at the end of September,” said Fabien Teitgen, the technical director of Smith-Haut-Lafitte, which made excellent reds and dry whites. “In fact, it helped the cabernet sauvignon. It keeps them fresh and the alcohol levels lower.”

Helen Genin, the technical director of Chateau Latour, explained that cabernet was quite high in alcohol by the second week of September, then it started raining and they waited until near the end of the month. This reduced sugar slightly and brought pH down as well. “It brought a balance to the ripe merlot. We were happy,” she said.

Most producers on the Right Bank picked the majority of their crop before the late September rain, which is perhaps why the top wines are slightly denser than their Left Bank counterparts.

Another reason the wines have balance with ripeness is that yields were sometimes double those in 2022, which had tiny yields because of poor flowering and an extremely hot and dry growing season. Not only were there fewer bunches, but the berries were very small and thick-skinned in 2022. In 2023, there was a large crop and larger berries.

“We had double the size of the crop in 2023 compared to 2022,” Moueix said. “We green-harvested at the end of July and early August, but the clusters were full of grapes. This clearly helped with the balance. We had almost three times more berries.”

Stephanie de Bouard-Rivoal of Château Angelus said they made 300,000 bottles of their second wine, the Tempo d’Angélus Bordeaux, in 2023, compared with 170,000 bottles in 2022. “We are happy that people like our 2023. We are happy with higher yields because it keeps freshness.”

I heard from many producers, and it matches my own experience making wine, that when vines carry more crop grapes tend to accumulate less sugar, as long as there is no severe dehydration from extreme heat. That was clearly the case in 2023, when alcohol and pH numbers were lower than in 2022 for most wines. Overall, it gives brighter, fresher palates.

I remember in the 1980s, when I was just beginning to cover Bordeaux, that top years such as 1982, 1989 and 1990 had very large crops. Some producers made more than 60 hectoliters per hectare and had to send some of the overproduction to be distilled. Yet the wines had such balance and verve, even the most structured ones, and they continue to live beautifully if bottles were stored properly.

“The 2023 is relatively classic but you that the nose is fresh and perfumed but then you have some warmth at the end,” said Guillaume Thienpont, who made two perfect wines in the vintage, Le Pin and Vieux Chateau Certan. “If you didn’t have this you would have had more flamboyance like 2022. It stays warm but not burning. It is complete.”

“It’s not the winemaker that did this in the cellar; nature gave it to us,” he said. “This is a year that every good winemaker would like to sign up with.”

Besides Thienpont’s two wines, my best wines of the 2023 vintage were also the 100-point Montrose, Petrus and Yquem. The latter is a special case, marking the third perfect vintage for the legendary sweet-wine estate.

“We are experiencing something incredible,” said Chateau d'Yquem estate manager Lorenzo Pasquini. “We are experiencing only our second trilogy. The first was the 1988, 1989 and 1990. And now we have this.”

He added: “The 2021 is very fresh and intellectual and 2022 is very warm; it is the driest and warmest ever recorded with so much sugar. And then you have the 2023, which has the character of both vintages. It has the freshness of 2021 and the power of 2022. It has the synthesis of the two.”

The debate over which vintage leads this trio will never really end. Yet 2023’s place among them underlines a simple truth: without the shadow of 2022, far more people would be calling 2023 a terrific vintage for reds, dry whites and sweet wines. And the best wines are generally much more reasonably priced, often 20 to 30 percent less than 2022.

– James Suckling, Editor & CEO

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