Placeholder Image

Marcel Lapierre, Morgon, Cuvee MMXIV

Burgundy, France 2014 (750mL)
$48.00
/
Your cart is empty.
  • In stock, ready to ship
  • Inventory on the way
Fruit
Earth
Body
Tannin
Acid
Alcohol

Marcel Lapierre, Morgon, Cuvee MMXIV

This wine from the famed Domaine Marcel Lapierre transcends labels, regions, and any preconceived notions you may have about the Gamay grape. Crafted by an estate that led the natural wine movement and the thrust to maintain tradition without regard to cost, the 2014 Morgon “Cuvée Marcel Lapierre” is truly one of the greatest expressions of Gamay you or I will ever taste.
From one of the most outstanding vintages Beaujolais has experienced in distant memory and derived from 100-year-old vines, this wine is simply magnificent now and has decades ahead of it. We are overjoyed to receive a tiny allocation of this wine, which is only made in the very best vintages.
As Kermit Lynch once said,

“Nobody’s wines taste like Marcel Lapierre’s. He is the source of a whole new school of winemaking, turning the hands of time back to wine the way Mother Nature envisioned it. Tasting it can change the way you taste wine.”

Since Lynch experienced this revelation decades ago, many winemakers have followed in Lapierre’s footsteps, but he was an original leader in Beaujolais’ biodynamic wine movement, along with his “gang of four,” which includes Guy Breton, Jean-Paul Thevenet, and Jean Foillard. With Lapierre at the helm, the gang of four not only turned back the hands of time and began crafting traditional wines with biodynamic viticulture, but they also created wines that achieved the purest expression of Gamay in Beaujolais in a culture of insipid, carbonic maceration Beaujolais Nouveau styles. Lapierre is not only responsible for the rejuvenation of Beaujolais’ formerly degraded reputation, but he is also a trailblazer for the worldwide biodynamic wine scene.

This 2014 Cuvée Marcel Lapierre hails from the village of Morgon, which is one of the ten cru villages of Beaujolais. What makes this wine even more of a rare treasure is that it is derived from 100-year-old vines, rooted in inimitable granitic gravel, from the very best casks and is crafted only in the best years. The Cru village of Morgon, where the Lapierre family has called home since 1904, produces one of the most full-bodied and age-worthy wines of the ten crus. When Marcel took the reigns of this site from his father back in 1973, he was on a course to becoming a marvel in the wine world, thanks in part to his friend, Jules Chauvet, who was a winemaker, chemist, and biodynamic proponent. By 1981, Lapierre was crafting biodynamic wines and returning Beaujolais’ Gamay to its former glory. In the mid-2000s, Marcel brought his son, Mathieu, on board. Together, they maintained their natural winemaking philosophy while pushing the envelope further by embracing organic certification. Marcel celebrated his last harvest in 2010, but Mathieu has reverentially continued his father’s remarkable legacy along with the philosophy he pioneered in Beaujolais. The grapes are hand-harvested then fermented, whole cluster, with only indigenous yeasts. The wine is aged on its lees in large Burgundian oak that ranges from three to thirteen years of age, which allows this natural Gamay’s pure expression and its terroir’s thriving life to shine through in the glass. The wine is bottled unfiltered and is totally unadulterated by manipulation. The result is the culmination of decades towards a nurtured ecosystem and a time-honored tradition that is a rarity throughout the world. In short, this is a bucket list wine if there ever was one.

The 2014 Cuvée Marcel Lapierre exhibits a light ruby red core with pink highlights on the rim. The pure and perfumed nose charms with freshly picked wild strawberry, red cherry, pomegranate and raspberry laced with fresh violets, black tea, tree bark and wet granite. The velveteen palate is medium-plus in body and unfolds with candied orange rind, red and black cherry, cranberry and grape seeds intertwined with licorice, white pepper, wet earth and herbs as well as graphite minerality, which is supported by fine, supple tannins. This wine is true beauty that is simply teeming with energy and life.

Placeholder Image
Country
France
Region
Burgundy
Sub-Region
FranceBeaujolais
Soil
Granite
Farming
Biodynamic
Blend
Gamay
Alcohol
13.0

France

Bourgogne

Beaujolais

Enjoying the greatest wines of Beaujolais starts, as it usually does, with the lay of the land. In Beaujolais, 10 localities have been given their own AOC (Appellation of Controlled Origin) designation. They are: Saint Amour; Juliénas; Chénas; Moulin-à Vent; Fleurie; Chiroubles; Morgon; Régnié; Côte de Brouilly; and Brouilly.

Southwestern France

Bordeaux

Bordeaux surrounds two rivers, the Dordogne and Garonne, which intersect north of the city of Bordeaux to form the Gironde Estuary, which empties into the Atlantic Ocean. The region is at the 45th parallel (California’s Napa Valley is at the38th), with a mild, Atlantic-influenced climate enabling the maturation of late-ripening varieties.

Central France

Loire Valley

The Loire is France’s longest river (634 miles), originating in the southerly Cévennes Mountains, flowing north towards Paris, then curving westward and emptying into the Atlantic Ocean near Nantes. The Loire and its tributaries cover a huge swath of central France, with most of the wine appellations on an east-west stretch at47 degrees north (the same latitude as Burgundy).

Northeastern France

Alsace

Alsace, in Northeastern France, is one of the most geologically diverse wine regions in the world, with vineyards running from the foothills of theVosges Mountains down to the Rhine River Valley below.

Others We Love