Winemaker Notes
Intense ruby red color. Spicy aromas with earthy, mineral, tobacco and pleasant wild berry notes. On the palate, it has intense tannins needed for aging the high concentration of the regional components typical to Fèlsina and Poggio a Rancia.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
This wine opens to rich intensity and a dark purple-blackish color that is simply gorgeous to behold. The 2013 Chianti Classico Gran Selezione Colonia is a superb expression that delivers so much joy on almost every measurable level. This vintage offers superb density and intensity with sharply defined aromas of black cherry, ripe blackberry, spice, leather and moist tobacco. There is a sweet note on the close that lasts for a minute or two before returning your taste buds to sophisticated and savory flavors. This is a gorgeous, gorgeous achievement.
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James Suckling
Complex aromas of raspberries, blueberries, red plums and hot stones. Some new wood, too. Medium to full body, ripe and velvety tannins and a long very crisp finish. I like the intensity and the style here. Delicious now.
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Wine Spectator
Ripe, settling into a complex range of plum, cherry, leather, camphor and iron aromas and flavors. This is really finding its voice, with a core of sweet fruit midpalate and a long, firmly structured aftertaste. Spicy finish. Drink now through 2029.
Among Italy's elite red grape varieties, Sangiovese has the perfect intersection of bright red fruit and savory earthiness and is responsible for the best red wines of Tuscany. While it is best known as the chief component of Chianti, it is also the main grape in Vino Nobile di Montepulciano and reaches the height of its power and intensity in the complex, long-lived Brunello di Montalcino. Somm Secret—Sangiovese doubles under the alias, Nielluccio, on the French island of Corsica where it produces distinctly floral and refreshing reds and rosés.
One of the first wine regions anywhere to be officially recognized and delimited, Chianti Classico is today what was originally defined simply as Chianti. Already identified by the early 18th century as a superior zone, the official name of Chianti was proclaimed upon the area surrounding the townships of Castellina, Radda and Gaiole, just north of Siena, by Cosimo III, Grand Duke of Tuscany in an official decree in 1716.
However, by the 1930s the Italian government had appended this historic zone with additonal land in order to capitalize on the Chianti name. It wasn’t until 1996 that Chianti Classico became autonomous once again when the government granted a separate DOCG (Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita) to its borders. Ever since, Chianti Classico considers itself no longer a subzone of Chianti.
Many Classicos are today made of 100% Sangiovese but can include up to 20% of other approved varieties grown within the Classico borders. The best Classicos will have a bright acidity, supple tannins and be full-bodied with plenty of ripe fruit (plums, black cherry, blackberry). Also common among the best Classicos are expressive notes of cedar, dried herbs, fennel, balsamic or tobacco.