The Domaine Les Alexandrins of Rhône septentrional of Rhone Valley

Like many teenagers, I was obsessed with movies when I was growing up. When I see original posters today for films I enjoyed back then, the effect is immediate – a glance somehow conjures the story, the characters and the emotional impact all at once. Today, wine labels can have a similar effect. And what more iconic labels are there in the Rhône than Guigal’s single vineyard Côte-Rôties? When I see the red and gold label of La Mouline, it has the same effect as when I’m confronted with the post ...

Onwards, upwards. The roads get narrower, the corners get tighter. I step out of the car when I finally reach the winery and the air is so much fresher here. I go to take a sip from my water bottle and a gust of wind makes it whistle. I stand with Thomas Jullien and we look over the vineyards. It’s not yet spring, and the vines look little more than sticks. ‘It’s a lunar landscape at the moment,’ he says, as a friend’s flock of 300 sheep has just passed through to graze on every scrap of green b ...

Colin Hay, a professor of political economy with a special interest in the Place de Bordeaux, considers the different ways of approaching en primeur purchasing, ahead of this year’s 2021 campaign. Buying en primeur wines is a rather strange and, arguably, arcane system of buying and selling in which the consumer purchases the wine typically in the early summer following the vintage even though it will not be bottled and delivered for a further 12-18 months. It is, in effect, a futures mark ...