Lynch Bages

 

 

Château Lynch Bages

One of the most well-known of the Medoc chateaux, Lynch Bages has long had a strong following in traditional markets, in particular the British market. In contemporary times, ongoing promotion in line with its consistently high-performing vintages continues to make it new friends in a market that is more global than ever before. Lynch Bages is arguably one of the very strongest Bordeaux brands of them all.

Like many chateaux, Lynch Bages is firmly founded on a sense of history and place, beginning with its name. Bages, a Pauillac village near the banks of the Gironde, was the place where, for hundreds of years, most Bordeaux winemakers made their home. For the first mention of which, in the 1500s, we must go to the records of neighbouring chateau, Lafite Rothschild. John Lynch was from Galway, in the West of Ireland. He was one of the Wild Geese, the Jacobite army that set off for France following the Treaty of Limerick at the end of the wars of William of Orange in Ireland in 1691. Lynch eventually settled in Bordeaux. In 1749, his son Thomas Lynch, inherited a local estate through his wife Élisabeth, thus beginning the illustrious history of chateau Lynch Bages.

The vineyards were initially expanded by the Déjean family in the years prior to the arrival of the Lynch family, with whom it was to remain for next 75 years. In the decades prior to the determinant 1855 Classification of the Medoc, Sébastien Jurine, a négociant from Geneva bought the chateau in 1824 and his son, André-Louis, steered the estate successfully through the classification. Jurine Bages, as it was then called, was then bought by the Cayrou brothers, themselves successful negociants from Bordeaux, who restored its name to Chateau Lynch Bages.

The contemporary era of Chateau Lynch Bages undoubtedly begins in the 1930s, a decade when Bordeaux hardly saw a good vintage. Jean-Charles Cazes, who was the estate manager at Chateau Ormes de Pez in St. Estephe entered into an agreement with the chateau owner, General Félix de Vial, to lease the vineyards of Lynch Bages. Following World War II, he determined to purchase them outright and Lynch Bages remains in the Cazes family to this day. The Cazes family has a long history in Bordeaux, having been there since the second half of the 19^th century.  Family members have worked variously as bakers, in military service during the Great War and later, following the loss of the bakery to fire in 1924, in banking. Jean Charles Cazes was to have a decisive influence on quality, determining to extend the ripening season by leaving the grapes on the vine longer in an uncompromising pursuit of ripeness. The result was the hallmark powerful Pauillac wine for which the chateau is known and has perfected today, somewhere perhaps, between the traditional and modern.

It was in this period that the chateau came to the attention of Alexis Lichine, a Russian writer, entrepreneur and Medoc winegrower, who joined with Cazes to help promote his wines on world markets. In the intervening years much renovation, of vineyard,  cellar and expansion of the former, has occurred at Chateau Lynch Bages and the latest generation in the form of Jean-Michel Cazes. Jean Michel Cazes, today one of the elder statesmen of the Bordeaux Place, took the helm from Jean Charles in joining with his brother, André, in 1973, coinciding with the opening up of the US market. A new generation undertook the latest stage of renovation over the last 30 years or more modernizing the estate and preparing it for new horizons.

 

Massal Selection

It should be noted that Lynch Bages initiated an extensive vineyard programme with the aim of preserving genetic material and diversity for future generations. In 2005 the estate adopted ‘selection massale’, a traditional approach to vineyard management that fell out of favour in 1960s and 1970s and replaced by the use of clones from a single mother vine, which became the rule in Bordeaux. The Cazes family believe that this would ultimately lead to a loss of vineyard identity and significant risk from the dependence on just one vine type.

Massal selection involves identifying and taking cuttings from outstanding individual vines from which new ones are then propagated for future use. The estate uses only parcels of vines of 50 years or more, chosen to perpetuate this original vineyard diversity, which Cazes further feels is now optimally adapted to the estates’ differing terroirs. The first results of these will come with the 2010 vintage (Petit Verdot) and 2011 (Cabernet Sauvignon).

 

Style

Lynch Bages is a wine between the traditional and modern, displaying textbook Bordeaux on the one hand – cassis, tobacco, cedar – and elegant Pauillac power on the other, with the ripe freshness that is the chateau’s salient feature. The best vintages can age for up to 30 – 50 years.

 

Top-rated vintages

Vintage	RP	JR	market price £	£/ Parker points
2009	94-96+	17	1,075	11.32
2006	92	16	790	8.59
2005	91	17	970	10.66
2000	95	17.5	1,890	19.89
1999	90	16.5	850	9.44
1996	94	17.5	1,440	15.32
1995	91	16	1,200	13.19
1990	97	17.5	2,100	21.65
1989	95	17.5	2,100	22.11

As per June 2011

 

Market

Lynch Bages, the wine that befriends wherever it goes, has long punched above its fifth growth weight due to the telling combination of terroir, savoir faire and, of late, promotion in new markets, in particular Asia. With a string of high-performing recent vintages, a notable history and reputation for consistent wines somewhat bridging the classic and modern in style, few chateaux of any class are better positioned to take advantage of the contemporary market than Chateau Lynch Bages.

Liv-ex Power 100 ranking

2010	total score	2009	move
28	230	32	+1

As per June 2011

The Liv-ex Power 100 is a list of the top performers over the previous year and their position starting the current year.  The indice traces the movement of chateau and other wines using a sophisticated weighting system based on average prices, production, notional availability and Parker Points.

 

Release price evolution

 

Vintage	ex Negociant € / btl	London release price £ / cs
2009	72	845
2008	32	349
2007	40	395
2006	40	360
2005	49.50	500

 

Lynch Bages at a glance

Commune: Pauillac

Soils: an alluvial, sand and gravel mix but overall quite homogeneous and comprised mainly of Garonne gravel, called Günz, originating in the very slow erosion by the Garonne of the Pyrenees mountain range. There is a thin layer of clay within the mix.free-draining gravel bed with limestone on raised ground.

Climate: maritime, moderated by the Gironde estuary and Atlantic Ocean, pine forests provide insulation from strong winds off the ocean and help to lessen summer temperatures.

District: Medoc

Classification: 5th Cru Classe

Owner: Jean-Michel Cazes

Winemaker: Daniel Llose

Vineyard: 90Ha./222.30 acre of which Cabernet Sauvignon 75%, Merlot 15% and Cabernet Franc 10%. 6Ha./14.82 acres of vineyard is given over to 53% Sauvignon,32% Semillon and 15% Muscadelle.

Vinification and ageing: stainless steel vats, emphasis on pumping over, followed by oak-ageing (60% new) for 15 months.

Production: 25,000 cases