04 May 2021

Released this morning, the 2020 vintage from Château Beaumont starts our en primeur campaign with a great value favourite, one of the most reliable benchmarks of quality in the Haut-Médoc.  We still have more wines to taste to determine our final views on the character of the vintage, but what does seem certain is that the 2020 vintage as a whole is one of the few good things to have come out of last year. 

Over the last couple of weeks, we have tasted and re-tasted several cask samples of Beaumont and have enjoyed it every time.  At just £100 per dozen bottles in bond, we believe this is one of the best value clarets available, with James Suckling scoring it 92-93 points.

Beaumont has been on a roll since the 2015 vintage, with '16, '17, '18  and '19 all scoring highly with the critics.  The character of the 2020 is in line with the vintage as a whole.  Our tasting note for Beaumont has many of the same elements as we found in wines across the board... intensity and purity of fruit, with very fine delineation, if not the concentration of a vintage like 2018.  Blackberry and cherry aromas feature repeatedly...i.e. dark fruit character, but with delicacy and complexity.   Beaumont also showed surprisingly complex notes of earth, black tea and violets, contributing to the impression that this is a classic year.  

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See Beaumont's technical director Anthony Yaigre describe the 2020 vintage:

Offered en primeur, landing spring 2023.

Producer Profile

Château Beaumont, Cru Bourgeois Haut-Médoc

Château Beaumont is Cru Bourgeois estate in Cussac, in the Haut-Médoc.  Under the same ownership as Châteaux Beychevelle and Lagrange (the Socétié Grands Millésimes de France), it is always a benchmark for the Cru Bourgeois and is also very accessible, as the estate is quite large at 113 hectares, producing over 50,000 cases in most years.

The origins of the estate date back to 1772 when the land was bought by Henri Labarthe.  The vineyard was planted in 1824 by a Monsieur Bonnin.  From 1830 to 1847 it belonged to the Marquis d’Aligre, one of the wealthiest men in France, who tripled the area under vine. In 1849 the estate passed into the hands of the Bonnin brothers, who built Château Beaumont in 1854 in a Renaissance 'mansard' style.

The vineyards are between the communes of Margaux and Saint-Julien and Beaumont draws on elements of both terroirs.  The main soil type is Gunzian gravel and the vines average 20 years of age, planted at a density of 6600-7000 vines per hectare; 53 % Cabernet Sauvignon, 42% Merlot, 5% Petit Verdot.   The wine is aged for 12-14 months in barriques, one-third of the new.  Éric Boissenot is consultant oenologist and Anthony Yaigre is cellar master.