1966 Chateau Clos de Sarpe Saint-Emilion Grand Cru 750 ml

Our wine team was recently treated to one of the most special bottles we’ve ever had the fortune of tasting: 1966 Clos de Sarpe Saint-Émilion Grand Cru, direct from the château’s cool cellars.

We were beyond impressed—we were blown away. And we weren’t the only ones: Critic Jeb Dunnuck recently visited Clos de Sarpe for an unprecedented tasting of 40 vintages from 1952–2015, he found this 1966 to be the greatest 20th-century bottle on the table:  “It's just a beautiful, classy, complex Saint-Emilion that shows the singular style of this domaine.” 

Clos de Sarpe is a minuscule estate known for some of the most ageworthy wines in Bordeaux—one of the most fascinating small producers on the Right Bank. They do not make much: around 1,000 cases per year from their 10-acre vineyard.

“There is so much power, depth, and concentrated fruit that serious Bordeaux consumers need to give it a try,” wrote Robert Parker in his Bordeaux opus, about Clos de Sarpe, a Saint-Émilion Grand Cru property farmed organically by the same family for a century.

Château Clos de Sarpe is a small estate nestled on the upper limestone plateau east of Saint-Emilion, in a cooler region near Saint-Christophe-des-Bardes. This tiny vineyard of less than four hectares is planted with 85% Merlot and 15% Cabernet Franc—all farmed organically and boasting very old vines.