2020 Domaine William Fèvre Chablis Les Clos Grand Cru
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Tasting notes
William Fèvre is the largest owner of Grand Cru Les Clos, with four of the appellation’s 25 hectares. The estate has four plots, three of which are at the top of the hill, on stonier soils which bring more freshness to the wine. Their vines were mainly planted by William’s father in the 1940s and ’50s, lending old-vine intensity to what is an extraordinary wine in 2020. The nose is pure minerality – with chalk, oyster shell and flint-stone over a base of grapefruit pith. But there’s a subtlety here, with delicate florals shifting in and out of focus. On the palate, this ripples with mineral power. Tightly wound citrus makes for a taut palate, yet with gorgeous dry extract offering a textural richness. The oak (40% fermented in old barrique) provides roundness rather than flavour, building out the wine even more. Intense and balanced, this is a wine of immense class.
Critic scores
Neal Martin, Vinous
Jasper Morris MW, Inside Burgundy
More reviews and scores
A cool, restrained and airy nose grudgingly divulges its combination of lemon rind, green apple, quinine and acacia blossom scents that are also trimmed in discreet wood. There is again excellent volume and concentration to the powerful and muscular flavors that also coat the palate with dry extract on the impressively complex and hugely long finish. This is classic Les Clos in that it manages to be at once big and overtly powerful while remaining refined and classy. This is, in a word, stunning.
The 2020 Chablis Grand Cru Les Clos is another brilliant effort from Fèvre's immensely able winemaker, Didier Seguier, and his team. Unwinding in the glass with aromas of confit citrus, fresh bread, oyster shell, orange zest and crisp orchard fruit, it's full-bodied, satiny and muscular, with a concentrated, tensile profile and a long, intensely saline finish. It's the broadest and most powerful wine in the range, while remaining quintessentially Chablisien.
Tank sample. Inviting nose with plenty of honey, peach, nectarine and lemon peel. Rich weighty core of apple, verbena and peach with a precise streak of acidity through the middle, mineral, fresh and very very long. (AC)
About the producer
Established in the late 1950s, William Fèvre was one of the leaders in Chablis’s renaissance. Today he crafts benchmark expressions of fine Chardonnay from some of the top vineyard sites in the region, working with many of the best Premier and Grand Cru vineyards.