Domaine de Chevalier’s 2003 red wine was produced in the most extreme and controversial vintage in Bordeaux’s modern history: a summer of catastrophic heat that produced wines of exceptional alcoholic richness and atypical concentration across the left bank, and which the finest estates managed with the combination of early harvesting, careful cellar management and the exceptional terroir resources of their deep-rooted old vines. Domaine de Chevalier’s specific position deep within the Pessac-Léognan pine forest provides natural temperature moderation that no Médoc or Graves estate on the open plateau can replicate: the surrounding woodland buffers against the most extreme afternoon heat, provides natural humidity and creates a microclimate whose diurnal temperature variation more closely resembles a cool-climate region than the broader Bordeaux wine landscape in a year like 2003. This natural advantage allowed the estate to produce a 2003 of greater freshness, precision and structural integrity than most Pessac-Léognan contemporaries from the same vintage, and the wine has developed over twenty-two years into a genuinely interesting mature Bordeaux red of individual character.

The 2003 Bordeaux red wine vintage, while initially hailed as one of the great vintages of the modern era, has proved more complex and variable in its development than the 2009, 2010 or 2016: the extreme heat’s impact on natural acidity has caused some wines to decline faster than their structural appearance at harvest suggested, while others with naturally well-placed terroir and careful harvest timing have developed more gracefully. For Domaine de Chevalier, whose forest microclimate and consistently precise winemaking approach provided the tools to manage the 2003’s extremes with greater success than many of its peers, the 2003 rouge is among the more reliably interesting mature expressions of this vintage currently available.

A 2003 Domaine de Chevalier Rouge provides collectors and enthusiasts who are curious about this controversial but historically significant vintage with access to one of its most carefully produced and terroir-protected expressions from a classified Graves estate whose white wine programme is celebrated globally but whose red wine quality at its finest matches the very best in the Pessac-Léognan appellation.

Ruby with a mature and developed nose of ripe dark cherry, plum, tobacco, cedar, dried herbs and a warm, earthy, spiced mineral character from the estate’s forest terroir and the 2003 vintage’s natural richness. Full-bodied with supple, well-resolved tannins, reasonable residual acidity and a long, warm, savoury finish. Drink now through 2030.