2022 M & C Lapierre Morgon
The news from Vins Rare today is simply that our #1 selling Beaujolais is arriving and will be in stock next week. We sold out with my original email while it was pre-arrival and I haven’t had any of this to sell for the last 6-months.
We couldn’t let that stand, so rolled up our sleeves and I am happy to report 15 ( fifteen! ) more cases arrive on next week’s container. The Lapierre style is one of bold rich flavors and the 2022 version is another textbook example. It’s also another example of a domaine moving to grow biodynamically. I’ve been beating the drum to get you all to read up on this movement starting in Germany, rolling across France and slowly taking root in the United States. READ MORE: What is Biodynamic Farming?
This is one of those wines that is here one day - gone the next. If you haven’t yet grabbed some of this….. you know what to do. This stock won’t last.
This is a wild and fragrant red showing notes of dried flowers, moss, orange pith and red berry fruit. It’s medium-bodied, juicy and very fresh, with a tight and firm tannin frame that carries it a long way. This will last. Drink or hold.Â
-Â James Suckling, 94
2022 M & C Lapierre Morgon
S T O R Y
Marcel Lapierre took over his family's estate in Beaujolais at a time when not many cared about the region, except those that lived there. Over the next 4 decades Marcel was one of the vignerons, along with Guy Breton, Jean-Paul Thévenet, and Jean Foillard, who spoke out for “natural wine” and a return to the traditional methods of the Beaujolais. The old practices of viticulture and vinification starting with old vines, never using synthetic herbicides or pesticides, harvesting late, rigorously sorting to remove all but the healthiest grapes, adding minimal doses of sulfur dioxide or none at all, and disdaining chaptalization (the process of adding sugar to unfermented grape must in order to increase the alcohol content after fermentation ). It was his passion and commitment that has forever changed our perception of Beaujolais.
It’s hard to believe it has been 13 years since his passing. Today his son Mathieu and daughter Camille confidently continue the great work that their father pioneered. They have introduced biodynamic vineyard practices that further enhance the traditional methods that has garnered such a following for these wines.
The methods at Lapierre are just as revolutionary as they are traditional; the detail and precision with which they work is striking and entirely different from the mass-produced majority of Beaujolais on the market today. Decomposed granite comprises most of their eleven hectares, and the vines are an average of 45 years of age. Grapes are picked at the last possible moment to obtain the ripest fruit, which is a trademark of the estate style. The Lapierres’ age their wines on fine lees for at least nine months in oak foudres and fûts ranging from three to thirteen years old. These wines are the essence of Morgon: bright, powerful, age worthy wines where fleshy dark fruit is the center of attention.
