Chateau LaTour-Martillac 2016

Professional Ratings

• 94 James Suckling
  This is very perfumed with blackberry and blueberry aromas, but shows a hot-stone and blanched-almond undertone. Medium-to full-bodied with tight and silky tannins that are extremely polished and beautiful. Love the length and balance to this. Try after 2022.
• 93 Wine Enthusiast
  A structured wine backed by plenty of black-currant fruits, this is initially austere. Its richness needs time to develop and turn into the classically structured wine that this estate does so well. Drink from 2025.
• 93 Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
  The 2016 Latour Martillac is medium to deep garnet-purple in color with warm plums, kirsch and redcurrant jelly on the nose with touches of bay leaves, iron ore and black soil. Medium-bodied with a well-sustained mid-palate of muscular fruit, it has a firm backbone of fine-grained tannins and wonderful freshness, finishing very long.
• 92 Decanter
  This has a fairly high aromatic profile, with a lovely density of brambled blackberry and cassis that's deepened with time in the bottle. There’s a touch of austerity through the mid-palate and the acidity is relatively high, but there's fruit and tannin to back it up. It will age extremely well. Impressive.
• 91 Jeb Dunnuck
  The 2016 Château Latour-Martillac is also terrific and has a structured, medium-bodied, firm style that’s going to benefit from cellaring. Blackberries, graphite, new leather, and a kiss of tobacco all emerge from this nicely textured, pure, layered Pessac. Give bottles 4-5 years and enjoy over the following two decades.
• 90 Wine Spectator
  Solid, with a juicy yet restrained core of dark currant and blackberry compote flavors that should unwind nicely with modest cellaring thanks to nicely embedded brambly grip and dried tobacco leaf, anise and tar notes that run through the gutsy finish. Best from 2021 through 2026.