opinion / myths and realities


A dedicated follower of fashion Benjamin Lewin MW


another. But any review of the history of winemaking, even over short periods, shows that typicité (as the French call it) faithfully follows fashion. So, do grape varieties have intrinsic characters that come through time and place? Does typicité exist? Does even terroir exist, at least in the sense of conveying unique properties to the wine? As a practical corollary, is it reasonable for an AOP to insist in its agrément on conformance to some idealized view of its character? There may be no simple answer— indeed, the answer may depend on the prism of the grape variety through which you examine the question. At one extreme, take indigenous varieties that have never spread beyond their origins. Certainly, in many cases (perhaps most), this is because the variety does not make interesting enough wine for growers in other areas to try it out. If it has a typicity, it is uninteresting.


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On the other hand, there are varieties that make fantastic wines in their places of origin, but attempts to propagate them elsewhere have never been successful. Take Nebbiolo: Nothing has ever been produced anywhere else in the world, not even really elsewhere in Piedmont, to match the great Barolos and Barbarescos. Here is a unique match between place and variety that defines the concept of typicity. Take Sangiovese in Tuscany: It makes great wine in Montalcino, excellent wine in Chianti Classico, and good wine in Montepulciano. But even Antinori’s attempt to produce Sangiovese on Napa Valley’s Atlas Mountain did not produce wine to rival Antinori’s own results in Tuscany. Given the past decade of efforts to improve the quality of Chianti Classico—first with the 2000 project to improve clonal varieties, then with the introduction of a new top level, gran selezione, intended to produce


86 | THE WORLD OF FINE WINE | ISSUE 79 | 2023


f grapes or place have intrinsic character, typicity and fashion should be the absolute antitheses of one


Typicité faithfully follows fashion. So, do grape varieties have intrinsic characters that come through time and place? Does typicité exist? Does even terroir exist, in the sense of conveying unique properties to the wine?


world-class wines—it may be an open question whether the differences between Chianti Classico and Montalcino are a demonstration of intrinsic effects of terroir on typicity or due to constraints of history. Certainly, there are differences


even, for example, within the area of Montalcino, with some wines showing that faintly savage, savory character that for me is the typicity of Sangiovese but others tending more toward deep, chocolaty overtones. Of course, that brings up another question. Let’s accept for the moment that there is a typicity to each grape variety, at least if it is not grown under extreme circumstances (such as very hot or very cold places, or very dry or very wet places). It is always possible to destroy typicity with extremes of winemaking, lashings of new oak being the most obvious technique.


Proof or refutation? At the other extreme, we might ask whether the “international variety” is the ultimate proof of typicity (character comes through, independent of time and place) or the ultimate refutation (the variety can be grown anywhere without any particular affinity for one place, and its character depends on each place). In the case of Cabernet Sauvignon, perhaps the best-known international


variety, fashion may play as important a role as any intrinsic character. You might say that fashion drives—perhaps even created—the concept of the international variety, because what else was the impetus to grow the variety in places far from its origins but an attempt to jump on a fashion?


When Cabernet Sauvignon was first


grown in Napa Valley in the early 1970s, the basic concept was to repeat its success in Bordeaux by producing the same sort of wine. After the Judgment of Paris success in 1976, opinion moved to the view that Napa could produce a different sort of wine, richer and fruitier. After the 1982 vintage in Bordeaux heralded the start of warmer vintages, Bordeaux moved to imitate Napa, with later harvests producing wines richer, fuller, and less overtly tannic than anything produced before. Until the 1970s, Left Bank Bordeaux often had quite a herbaceous tang— delicious in a top vintage but admittedly sometimes out of hand in cooler vintages. Herbaceousness was regarded as part of the DNA of the variety. Today, if you mention the word “herbaceous” to a winemaker in Bordeaux, he will wrinkle up his nose—if he does not actually throw you out of the château. The driving force for Cabernet Sauvignon today is the fashion for phenolic ripeness. It’s not unfair to say that differences in styles are due mostly to differences in the concept of exactly what ripeness means, just how far to go. I take the view that at the extreme of ripeness, all grape varieties tend to taste the same: very fruity, jammy, with high-toned aromatics. At the extreme of overripeness, Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz (rather than Syrah, since the New World is where most of the extremely ripe Syrah-based wines are found), Merlot, Grenache, and even Zinfandel all have a similar character. For people who complain that these wines have lost typicity, I would say that


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