What will the future's mature wines be like?

This is a question which has been on my mind lately, particularly with the latest 1982 Bordeaux thread.

When we consider the generality of the wine world, will the vintages of the last decade age in a significantly different way from vintages of the past? Will dumb phases be more forgiving and structured wines no longer require many decades to show their worth? In the wines’ changing profiles, do improvements in viticulture and global warming go hand in hand or against each other? I am particularly interested in the feedback of those old/experienced enough to have tasted vintages of the past both in their youth and in their maturity, allowing them, to some extent, to extrapolate this parallel to more recent vintages.

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Overall wine is more accessible due to improvements in viticulture and winemaking. Long gone are the days where Barolo needed 30+ years to be drinkable.

The great wines of the world should continue to age gracefully though.

Good question and…I don’t know.
I think some wines will be ready sooner, like nebbiolo-based wines.
I’d like to think Rioja will always age in its own idiosyncratic way, that is, rather timeless.
Bordeaux seems more charming throughout it’s life now instead of some really harsh periods it used to go through.
Rhone wine seems to have gotten more concentrated and rounded but I’m not sure how it will show in 15-20 years.
I believe modern viticulture will need to adapt to climate changes, otherwise nature will gain the upper hand. Ripeness, phenolic or otherwise, won’t be so much an issue, but handling heat speaks, frosts, hail and rain damage may.

Better knowledge, viticulture, techniques will allow for wines which don’t require the amount of aging required previously. Vintage Port is an example. Also for VP, the improvements in aquardente have helped enormously.

Yes, that is David Guimaraens’ point of view - I was thinking of that when I created this thread, though I didn’t mention it. Still, you will see many people on this board talking about waiting for a very long time on more recent/current releases of various wines.

I’m not sure we know what the emphasis on “more-ness” is going to mean for wine aging in the long run. There are a lot of unpredictable elements. I remember when people talked about Parkerized vintages being more accessible younger too, because of good fruit sorting, lush fruit and the use of technology to smooth out tannins. But vintages like 00/05/10 took a long time to come around, longer than 80s vintages from what I hear, with 10 perhaps taking the longest. Now we have a people finessing tannins even more and vowing that they have backed off on extraction, but still getting a lot of fruit. It is obvious that wines are being made in ways they have not been made before, and aging is so mysterious I don’t think we can predict all the effects.

I also think better viticulture, improvements in winemaking and climate change made wines ready to drink younger than before.
Good examples are wines from Bordeaux and the Rhone Valley, they used to need more time to be ready to drink compared to now.

About the way the wines will age compared to how they aged before, I don’t know as I don’t have that much experience in older vintages. Maybe if they’re ready to drink younger, their ageing potential will be shorter? Or maybe they’re better structured and able to age as long as the older vintages?

The thing that’s sure is that producers will need to implement new techniques to be able to withstand the effects of the climate change, with more and more problematic weather events…
I’ve read last month that vines were already at budburst (supposed to be in spring…) and didn’t enter their dormant period in Burgundy, Languedoc and Provence.

Actually, the Bordeaux 1982 example is a good one. Many people correlated early accessibility with a short life, which is not at all what happened. Unlike subsequent vintages, I think it was nature’s accident rather than Man’s design - which probably accounts for a lot.

Looking at more recent ripe Bordeaux vintages, many thought that 2003 would fall apart early - which it hasn’t. It’s completely different to 1982, but the good wines have remained good. 2005 is the complete opposite to 82 - fearsomely tannic still, the question is whether or not the fruit will last long enough (fingers crossed). 2009 is a tough one - the wines tasted too Tigger-like for me from the start (jumping up and down, licking your face and overexcited!) and some are starting to taste syrupy and pruney. I suspect that they were victims of the fashion at the time, which is an opportunity missed. But I think the top wines will age well. Likewise 2010 - a bit overdone but the better acidity and grip should see them age well. Anything more recent still is too young to say.

As Alexia rightly says, people will need to adapt, which most of them are doing. All the instruction manuals so generously provided by those wonderful wine consultants are now out of date. Hopefully too, more and more will go organic and actually follow what nature suggests rather than what some critic said fifteen years ago. I’m actually quite confident about the future as the demand is for this kind of wine.

You only have to try some Loire reds or other organic producers elsewhere to know that these wines are both accessible and age-worthy.

I think about this question too, and would be likewise eager to hear thoughts from some board statesmen/women who have tasted wines from the 80s on release.

My own take is that we are still in a transitional time – meaning that while many producers and regions have (broadly) adopted the use of technology such as optical sorters, there are market trends favoring minimal intervention and wines that reflect a classical approach. Even in a single region, you can’t paint with too wide a brush - the landscape is too heterogenous.

As an example, a 2015 Smith Haut Lafite was about as firmly closed as a brand new swiss army knife the last I tasted, whereas a 2016 Pontet Canet was open, aromatic, lithe, and felt like it might not shut down at all. The answer of how a given wine is likely to age these days is probably specific to that wine or producer. I don’t think tertiary flavors can be rushed by modern techniques, even if some wines are more structurally accessible in their youth.

Like Julian says, I have little doubt that plenty of current release Loire CFs (Baudry, Raffault) will age similarly to their predecessors. Judging from the content of many other threads, it seems most of us expect wines from “traditional” chateau (thinking about Leoville Barton, Montrose, etc) to behave largely as they have in the past. I’m less optimistic about some of the favorite Napa cabs (which represent a significant albeit diminishing portion of my own cellar). Beckstoffer wines (pick your producer) have so much fruit and not enough acid that I don’t think many will ever shed their skin to resemble Diamond Creek/Dunn/Heitz wines from the 80s. That said, I think they will hold a good long while before falling apart.

My main fear is that modernized wines from solar years will develop prune/raisin notes before or instead of cigar, coffee, etc. I’m holding a fair number of 2009s from all over for our anniversary with fingers crossed so will report on them over time.

As has been emphasized already, the most successful estates will be those that can first adapt to climate changes in the vineyard.

I think this is a question that one can start to answer experientially rather than speculatively since modernist techniques have been around for 25 years or so. My own experience is very limited. I have not found that the 95 Monbousquet I bought aged gracefully, nor the 98 Mordoree, but I would not want to generalize from that. Surely people have, for instance, 00 Pavies they can try, though, to name an obvious example. In CdP, the special cuvees of Clos St. Jean have been around since 03 as well. There are a lot of other examples of modernist wines with age on them that could create the basis for a discussion based on experience with them.

Yes, while there’s lots of talk about improved techniques and vineyard management, the biggest change of all, across regions, is the fact that wines are being picked much riper than they were in the past, whether by choice or because of more warm vintages. That certainly helps to make them more approachable young. But the alcohol of today’s Bordeauxs (and many other categories) averages much higher than the 82s, so it’s hard to predict their long-term development.

I think it was Wes Barton who explained (and I’m probably mangling the details) that the precursors to a lot of aroma compounds are damaged as grapes get riper. I.e., riper wines may not develop the same aroma profile.

In general, wines are more approachable than they used to be. Certainly, there are exceptions like 2005 Burgundy and Bordeaux (sometimes nature does what it wants to do), but in general wines can be drunk younger with pleasure because of all the reasons people have stated.

But, Tomas, when you talk about whether structured wines will no longer require many decades to show their worth, I think you are missing the point. I know that you are newer to wine and I don’t know how much experience you have with older wines, but many people (myself included) age wines not because we have to but because we want to do so. Approachable young wines can be really good and fun to drink, but there is really nothing like the flavors that are added with a really good aged bottle of wine. You age wines because of what age adds to the wines (complexity), not what it subtracts from the wine (harshness). I have had a lot of excellent young wines, but, at least for reds, every one of my favorite wines has had age on it.

As John said, the issue for a lot of us is whether the riper wines being made today will age as well as traditional wines. Certainly, they are more approachable today, but will they get to the heights of the great wines of yesteryear. My guess is that it depends on the wine and that there is no one answer. But, this question is why a lot of people who love aged wine are a bit more conservative and lean towards more traditionally made wines over more modern styled wines because it is safer to age them.

It’s a mixed bag. None of my absolute favorite wines, including whites, have been less than 10 years old, and bottles in my (admittedly humble) cellar go back to the 1960s. Most of my most recent purchases have been of 15-35 year old wines. That being said, I do feel some younger, structured wines show their worth, whereas others not so much. What I mean is that some young wines will already show complexity, and while time will only enrich them further, it doesn’t feel like a complete sacrilege or a waste of time to drink them young. Others can feel one dimensional given the elevage, with oak obscuring elements that time will eventually unfurl. Others still may simply be harsh and unapproachable. If we get to preserve age worthiness without sacrificing all of the other things which have been pointed about today’s wines, that sounds terrific.

I agree with the questioning whether today’s riper, early maturing styles will have an effect on traditional maturation definition and bouquet development. I associate more ethereal and pleasing bouquets with old school wines, less ripe grapes, cooler growing conditions and less oak/baking spices.
Winosaurus?

my guess is that it will be a mixed bag. Along with all that is better farming, healthier grapes, cleaner winemaking, etc. I think wines from more traditional producers will still make wines that age in spite of climate change, but am less sure about wineries using more modern techniques. But, sometimes, I think terroir wins out.

It’s nice to hear that perspective. What we don’t talk about often is the potential positive impact on aging that might occur as a function of those changes.
I know Leve is a believer that many modern bordeaux are “better” than their predecessors, and has caught some flak for it; but that is often in reference to a current release wine
Is there an argument to be made that changes in viticulture and winemaking might produce wines that age either i) better (more complexity) ii) longer or iii) more uniformly?\

I understand John’s point about ripeness/hang times/picking dates being a key factor, but at some point, do we need to be specific about exactly which “modern” techniques are likely to result in better/worse long term results? No herbicides, improvements in canopy management, tilling practices, optical sorting, pump overs, RO - each has a variable effect on the resulting wine and renders it more or less ageable…

I cannot discuss all these topics but I doubt picking overripe grapes helps aging.

I would think that optical sorting would.