Weinbach Grand Cru Schlossberg Riesling 2020

Biodynamic. The Schlossberg hill has long been revered as one the world’s greatest Riesling vineyards. It’s a granitic outcrop that rises north of Kaysersberg and Kientzheim to an altitude of 230-350 metres. The quality of Schlossberg’s wines was established as early as the 15th century and this was the first vineyard in Alsace to receive Grand Cru status in 1975. With their eight hectares, the Faller family are the largest landowners in Schlossberg. They craft an extraordinary series of Rieslings from the hill, parcellated and bottled according to vine age and altitude. 

This wine was cropped from three parcels of the highest vines the family own, at the very top of the slope. Here, the soils are shallow and rocky, and therefore very mineral—with the eroded granite having a reddish tinge and high magnesium content. This combination of altitude, low-vigour soils and low yields is a potent one and gifts a deep but always very dry and mineral Riesling, with an intense freshness to balance the wine’s flesh. The 2020 was raised in large old casks for 14 months.

The 2020 Schlossberg might be the stuff wine moments are made of. It’s a striking and sensational Riesling of looming, monumental presence—at once hedonistic and potent but also bursting with purity, energy and refinement. The length alone is compelling. For those with a saint’s patience, Eddy Faller believes this release will be drinking beautifully well into its second decade. 

“Delightfully firm with so much personality and the sensation that you are licking stones in the vineyard! So firm, so pungent, yet so fruity. Gorgeous wine, essence of Riesling and already approachable. Steely finish suggests a long life ahead. Bone dry and very long.” 17.5 points, Jancis Robinson, jancisrobinson.com