Wine Advisor
Climens 2015
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Description
Tasting notes
Reviewed by: Lisa Perrotti-Brown
Pale lemon in color, the 2015 Climens is just a little closed, offering up lovely lemon curd, lime juice and apple tart notes with touches of acacia honey and paraffin. Fine, fresh and elegant in the mouth, with great purity and poise, it finishes with amazing persistence.
Reviewed by: Neal Martin
The 2015 Climens was tasted from different lots (after naughty Bérénice Lurton had successfully duped me with her April Fool's joke by saying that she had done a final blend). The fruit was picked from 8 September until 4 October at 21 hl/ha. The residual sugar is 130 grams per liter this year. Aromas that spring from samples included acacia honey, orange blossom, grapefruit and a little frangipane, all beautifully defined and gaining intensity in the glass. The palate is medium-bodied with a viscous opening, a dash of spice on the entry, lively in the mouth with ginger and a dash of pepper tincturing the honeyed fruit, long and sustained as it fans out with vigor. This is a fabulous Climens from Bérénice Lurton and her team, and as usual, those with wise heads will opt to lay bottles down for 15 years to get the most from this special Barsac. It is destined to be a great Climens - and that's no April Fool's joke.
Reviewed by: Neal Martin
The 2015 Climens always shows awkwardly after bottling, a Barsac that demands bottle age. Still, you can appreciate the intensity here, with touches of mint and jasmine complementing the honeyed fruit. The palate is just as it should be: very pure and refined, a perfect line of acidity, utterly harmonious with a viscous finish with hints of vanilla pod and orange pith lingering on the aftertaste. Bérénice Lurton has overseen a delectable Barsac that as usual will reward those with the nous to bottle long term.
Reviewed by: Antonio Galloni
Gracious, light on its feet and positively sublime, the 2015 Climens is one of the wines of the vintage. Its airiness and grace are hard to capture with words. Lightly honeyed notes, chamomile and exotic flowers lead into orchard fruit and candied citrus in this impeccably polished, nuanced Barsac. I would prefer to cellar the 2015 for at least a few years to get the benefit of even more complexity, but readers will have a very hard time keeping their hands off this gem from Climens and proprietor Bérénice Lurton.
Reviewed by: Neal Martin
The 2015 Climens is notoriously difficult to taste in its youth, the aromatics often shutting down for the first few years and consequently showing poorly in blind tastings. Indeed, this transpires during the blind tasting of 2015 Sauternes so I retrieved another bottle and allowed it 48 hours to open. This is where this note comes from. It has a bashful bouquet compared to its peers with notes of beeswax and honeycomb, just a touch of jasmine developing in the glass. The palate is well balanced with a lightly spiced opening, notes of stem ginger and rhubarb with a vivacious and quite persistent finish that bodes well for the future. It is a great Climens in the making, but it will need a decade in bottle. Tasted blind at the Southwold 2015 Bordeaux tasting.
About the Producer
Château Climens is a wine producer located in the Sauternes village of Barsac on the left bank of the Gironde river, south of Bordeaux. It was classified as a first growth in the 1885 Classification of Sauternes and Barsac alongside other châteaux such as Guiraud and Suduiraut. Climens is one of only a handful of châteaux in Bordeaux that produces its wines from only one grape: Semillon. The wine is characterized by fresh citrus notes, white flowers and spice, which becomes more honeyed and concentrated with age. Semillon thrives on the limestone-rich soils in the vineyards. Botrytis develops on the grapes because of the misty mornings, humidity and warmer afternoons that are typical during the months before harvest. If the grapes are not of the highest quality, or if botrytis has not properly formed, owner Bérénice Lurton and her team will not produce their top wine, the grand vin Château Climens. They have been bold enough in the past to declassify an entire harvest of fruit – either selling the grapes off to other producers rather than bottling as their own or releasing wines under secondary labels. The grapes are harvested and brought into the winery, plot by plot, where they are gently pressed before fermentation in oak barrels. Maturation takes place in French oak barrels on lees for about 20 months. Wines from the best vintages can last decades – a recent tasting of the 1921 vintage revealed a rich, balanced and zesty wine. Château Climens has been owned by the Lurton family since the 1970s (when it was acquired by Lucien Lurton), and in 1992 the estate came under the control of Bérénice Lurton (his daughter). In 2010, Climens began to practice biodynamic winemaking and viticulture, and the 2014 vintage was the first to be entirely certified as biodynamic. Chemical sprays were replaced with natural preparations and plant infusions, from flowers such as chamomile and juniper which are grown on the estate and dried in the attics above the chais.
