Winemaker Notes
An immense and pure wine with intense flavors and deep color, this is the perfect wine for aging.
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
Black fruits, smoke, graphite, crushed stone, and bloody nuances all emerge from the 2020 Côte Rôtie La Landonne, a magical, flawless Côte Rôtie that will need serious cellaring. Made from 100% Syrah and aged 42 months in new French oak, it's full-bodied and concentrated on the palate, with building tannins and incredible structure.
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James Suckling
This is ample, stunning and concentrated, with impressive energy. Dark berries, grilled herbs, stones, leather, undergrowth and loads of baking spices. Full-bodied with fine, sinewy tannins. There is a solid frame of tannins bringing a serious character on the palate. Dense, dark core of blackberries and spices funneling through the palate. Highly textured with incredible drive. Focused and shaped for aging.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Notes of green bell pepper, spices, pepper, iris, violet and dark berries introduce the 2020 Côte-Rôtie La Landonne, a full-bodied, concentrated and structured wine with a multidimensional core of fruit, lively acids and deep mid-palate underpinned by a chassis of firm tannins. Concluding long and spicy, it will demand some patience.
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Vinous
Dark as a moonless night, the knockout 2020 Côte-Rôtie La Landonne gradually unlocks its broad complexity, offering up prominent black pepper, graphite, cured meat and iodine notes as well as smoky blackberry jam and a touch of licorice. What’s so striking about this La Landonne is the flawless marriage of elevated flavor concentration with abundant freshness, depth and finesse. Firmly framed by a tight tannic core, the full-bodied 2020 is a modern-day legend. Rating: 98+
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Wine Spectator
A massive, powerful and densely packed red, with a pleasingly chewy texture -- the kind of wine to eat with a fork. Yet this shows impressive grace despite its weight, with savory earthiness underlying a torrent of bitter cherry, warm spices, mocha and coffee. Smoky, with cigar and leather accents. The finish goes on and on and on, held together by beautifully sculpted tannins.
The Guigal domain was founded in 1946 by Etienne Guigal in the ancient village of Ampuis, home of the wines of the Côte-Rôtie. In these vineyards that are over 2400 years old, you can still see the small terraced walls characteristic of the Roman period. Etienne Guigal arrived in this region in 1923 at the age of 14. He made wine for over 67 vintages and, at the beginning of his career, participated in the development of the Vidal-Fleury establishment.
Despite his young age, Marcel Guigal took over from his father in 1961 when the latter was victim to a brutal illness rendering him blind. Marcel's hard work and perseverance enabled the Guigals to buy out Vidal-Fleury in 1984, although the establishment retains its own identity and commercial autonomy. In 2000, the Guigals purchased the Jean-Louis Grippat estate in Saint-Joseph and Hermitage, as well as the Domaine de Vallouit in Côte-Rôtie, Hermitage, Saint-Joseph and Crozes-Hermitage.
In the cellars of the Guigal estate in Ampuis, the northern appellations of the Rhône Valley are produced and aged. These are the appellations of Côte-Rôtie, Condrieu, Hermitage, Saint-Joseph and Crozes-Hermitage. The great appellations of the Southern Rhône, Chateauneuf-du-Pape, Gigondas, Tavel and Côtes-du-Rhône, are also aged in the Ampuis cellars.
Marked by an unmistakable deep purple hue and savory aromatics, Syrah makes an intense, powerful and often age-worthy red. Native to the Northern Rhône, Syrah achieves its maximum potential in the steep village of Hermitage and plays an important component in the Red Rhône Blends of the south, adding color and structure to Grenache and Mourvèdre. Syrah is the most widely planted grape of Australia and is important in California and Washington. Sommelier Secret—Such a synergy these three create together, the Grenache, Syrah, Mourvedre trio often takes on the shorthand term, “GSM.”
The cultivation of vines here began with Greek settlers who arrived in 600 BC. Its proximity to Vienne was important then and also when that city became a Roman settlement but its situation, far from the negociants of Tain, led to its decline in more modern history. However the 1990s brought with it a revival fueled by one producer, Marcel Guigal, who believed in the zone’s potential. He, along with the critic, Robert Parker, are said to be responsible for the zone’s later 20th century renaissance.
Where the Rhone River turns, there is a build up of schist rock and a remarkable angle that produces slopes to maximize the rays of the sun. Cote Rotie remains one of the steepest in viticultural France. Its varied slopes have two designations. Some are dedicated as Côte Blonde and others as Côte Brune. Syrahs coming from Côte Blonde are lighter, more floral, and ready for earlier consumption—they can also include up to 20% of the highly scented Viognier. Those from Côte Brune are more sturdy, age-worthy and are typically nearly 100% Syrah. Either way, a Cote Rotie is going to have a particularly haunting and savory perfume, expressing a more feminine side of the northern Rhone.