The Classic French Legend
The first vines appeared on the gravel hillsides of Haut-Brion in the first century AD. In 1521, Château Haut-Brion became the first Bordeaux vineyard to be named after its terroir, instead of the owner or the parish, making the estate the first luxury wine brand in the world.
This led Haut-Brion to earn the rare distinction of Premier Grand Cru Classé (Classified First Growth) in the 1855 classification, the only cru outside the Médoc to receive this prestigious title.
Terroir
Château Haut-Brion’s vineyard is located in the commune of Pessac, just a few miles southwest of Bordeaux’s city center. It belongs to the Pessac-Léognan appellation, to the north of the Graves wine-growing region. Château Haut-Brion is the only wine to be both First Growth from the 1855 classification and Classified Growth of the Graves.
The birth of a legend
It was upon a terrace overlooked by two small hills and flanked by two streams that approximately 2,000 years ago, Romans came and discovered the virtues of these tiny quartz pebbles called “graves” (gravel). During Gallo-Roman times, the concept of terroir was already beginning to emerge. It was subsequently validated, in Burdigala (Bordeaux), by the identification of this very terrace with the toponym of “Haut-Brion”, used both in medieval manuscripts and on ancient maps. The legend was born and with it the very new notion of a premiere microclimate and soil that had the potential of producing wines of unparalleled quality.
Vintage 2006
Wine Advocate | 96 Pts
The 2006 Château Haut-Brion has a more ostentatious bouquet than the comparatively reserved La Mission: quite feisty blackberry, briary, kirsch and red plum scents, hints of leather and sage tucked just underneath. This is a bouquet determined to make an impression!
Vintage 2015
Jeb Dunnuck | 100 Pts
This full-bodied, concentrated, backward, yet sensationally pure 2015 boast knockout notes of blackcurrants, smoked tobacco, ground herbs, and graphite, with a terrific damp earth/minerality quality emerging with time in the glass.
Vintage 2018
Wine Advocate | 100 Pts
Deep garnet-purple in color, tilled earth, followed by pronounced licorice, then crushed rocks, then the preserved plums. Eventually, it all comes together into a fascinating crescendo of intense crème de cassis, rose oil, wild blueberries and kirsch notes.
