Thinking about future purchases. I loved the 2016 Domaine Hubert Lignier Clos de la Roche at Paulee, although it costs a pretty penny. Pricing has only gone up and I was reading that the estate now separates some of the juice into an MCMLV bottling (“he Clos de la Roche ‘MCMLV’ comes entirely from Henri’s first planting in 1955”). Has the ‘regular’ CdR suffered as a result of losing this old vine juice, or is it insignificant? I see only 433 bottles of the 2017 were made, but don’t know how much regular bottles are made (I see peak vintages on CT had as much as 600 bottles, which maybe suggests the MCMLV was not an insignificant amount of the juice?). Madrose spec sheet says CDR average vine age is 50-60 years, so the MCMLV is is stripping out vines that are only 10-20 years older.
I don’t think using CT data for these purposes is meaningful, since so many people don’t use CT. Lignier owns a hectare of Clos de la roche, and makes only one barrel of the MCMLV. I can’t imagine removing the oldest vines will make the base cuvée better, but I also don’t expect it to make a meaningful difference either.
A few of us had the 16 Clos de la roche a month ago and it’s still open and drinking wonderfully.
I haven’t noticed any deterioration myself. Bought both.
Asking the question another way, did you notice any difference between the two bottlings?
Yeah! The analogy I might make is between the regular Ridge Monte Bello and some of the Historic Vines bottlings. It is not a “bigger” wine and the two cuvées are very close in quality, with the MCMLV being a touch more intense and a touch livelier, while perhaps not quite as rich. The really interesting comparison will be after twenty or thirty years, and my impressions could just as well be related to the day I tasted as the reality of the wines themselves, honestly, given how fine these distinctions are.
I should have added I definitely bought the 17 regular bottling, but after thinking long and hard passed on the old vines due to price; I have no doubt it’s great.
Personally when the producers start to segregate and put out these luxury cuvees I’m out.
I can see why you might interpret it that way, given the way the wine market works, but the reality is that it’s a tiny part of their holdings that represents about one barrel, and which consistently makes less than 20 hl/ha, a tiny yield; so I think it’s either make this small special cuvée, as an homage to an earlier generation (Laurent Lignier’s grandmother insisted on buying the parcel because it never frosted), or replant. If this were about the $$$, it would be easier just to augment the price per bottle of the communal appellations by 1 EUR, which would surely pencil out as more than making one barrel of a special cuvée.
Ok. I believe you. Still I think most of these moves are vanity projects meant to shoot for higher scores and then prestige and money for the domaine. They are free to do that of course. But the net effect is to take out the best part of assemblage in theory at least. I’ve never been attracted to the Super cuvee thingy. Others can do as they like.
I tend to agree with you (even if the tendency is much more noticeable in more score-driven regions—Lignier will sell whatever numbers I pluck out of my hat, after all), which is why I stepped in to defend what I consider an exception!
Having met Laurent a number of times, I do not at all get the sense he is doing it for the scores, no 
was gonna say the same, he gave us a detailed explanation of the history of the vineyard with the family, really interesting stuff with them at CDLR. I didn’t buy the MCMLV but I do appreciate why he’s doing what he’s doing.