1964 | Chteau La Mission Haut-Brion | Pessac-Leognan

Introduction

Red Wine: 1964 | Chteau La Mission Haut-Brion | Pessac-Leognan

A surprisingly rich, round, delicious wine from an overlooked vintage. Medium ruby, with a garnet edge, ripe, perfumed raspberry aromas, full-bodied, with raspberry and earth flavors, medium-full tannins and a rich, sweet finish.

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Producer: Chteau La Mission Haut-Brion

Ratings: WA | 91 JG | 94

Vintage: 1964

Size: 750ml

ABV: 13%

Varietal: Bordeaux Blend Red

Country/Region: France, Bordeaux

A surprisingly rich, round, delicious wine from an overlooked vintage. Medium ruby, with a garnet edge, ripe, perfumed raspberry aromas, full-bodied, with raspberry and earth flavors, medium-full tannins and a rich, sweet finish.

Reviews:

• Wine Advocate: The year 1964 is one of those vintages that turned out to be great for Pomerol, St.-Emilion, and Graves, but most of the Mdoc properties got caught with their Cabernet Sauvignon unpicked when the heavy rains began to fall. La Mission-Haut-Brion has always been one of the great successes of the vintage, but it has just turned the corner and is beginning a slow decline. I say that having cellared quite a few bottles of this vintage, which allows me to taste it frequently. It displays a dark ruby color that is just beginning to show a trace of amber and orange. The bouquet is classic La Mission with scents of cedar, leather, smoke, and even a trace of truffles in this vintage. It is still an expansively flavored wine with a lovely, sweet ripeness to its fruit, and a heady, alcoholic finish.

• John Gilman: The 1964 La Mission is a beautiful example of the vintage that has now been fully mature for decades, but continues to drink at a very high level. The deep, complex and beautiful bouquet wafts from the glass in a classic blend of cassis, medicinal black cherries, singed tobacco, a lovely base of soil, a bit of roasted game and a smoky topnote. On the palate the wine is deep, full-bodied, pure and absolutely point, with beautiful focus and balance, a lovely core of velvety fruit and lovely length and grip on the resolved and vibrant finish.

Producer Information

Chteau La Mission Haut-Brion is an estate in the Pessac-Lognan appellation in the northern Graves, a few miles southwest of Bordeaux’s city center. Its near-neighbor and sister estate Chteau Haut-Brion was the only estate from the region featured in the 1855 Bordeaux Classification, but La Mission Haut-Brion (rated a Graves Grand Cru in the 1959 rankings) is often judged and priced as the equal of Haut-Brion and the other first growths. The wine is particularly known for its fruit intensity, rounded, generous texture and silky tannins, and has received multiple 100-point ratings from American critic Robert Parker. The vineyard shares the same gravelly terrain as Haut-Brion (which sits just over the road), with small quartz stones over a clay-sand subsoil. Around 27 hectares (66 acres) are planted to red grapes, comprising 47 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, 43 percent Merlot and 10 percent Cabernet Franc. A little more than three hectares (seven acres) are planted to Semillon and Sauvignon Blanc. Like Haut-Brion, its vineyards are now entirely surrounded by the houses of Bordeaux’s southwestern suburbs a railway line even bisects the property. La Mission Haut-Brion sees 18-22 months aging in barrel, with 80 percent new oak. Between 6000 and 7000 cases are produced each year. La Chapelle de La Mission Haut-Brion has been the second wine since 2006, when it replaced Chteau La Tour Haut-Brion. The estate also produces two Semillon-based white wines: La Mission Haut-Brion Blanc (formerly Laville Haut-Brion) and, since 2009, La Clart de Haut-Brion. The latter acts as a combined second wine for La Mission Haut-Brion and Haut-Brion Blanc. The estate takes its name from the Lazarite missionaries who owned it from 1682 until the French Revolution. It has been owned since 1983 by Domaine Clarence Dillon, the owner of Haut-Brion.