Château La Conseillante, Pomerol, 2025
Marielle Cazaux and consultant oenologist Thomas Duclos have returned La Conseillante to the very top of the Pomerol hierarchy. Their wines have quite a stylised character, usually veering towards the darker end of the fruit spectrum with plenty of exotic spice supported by velour tannins. The 2025 tempers this style somewhat. It still boasts a bouquet of luxuriant fruit, spiced cherries, pure raspberry, truffle, blueberries and violets, which leads to a cool composed palate of fine red fruit and minerals. There’s enough creamy-textured fruit, but it feels controlled and composed with lots of floral-accented blackcurrant. Snappy and sapid, it finishes with a real sense of energy, minerality and salinity and a well-integrated oak presence. A fresh and powerful La Conseillante crafted from 87% Merlot, 10% Cabernet Franc and 3% Cabernet Sauvignon.
critic reviews
The 2025 La Conseillante was cropped at 30 hl/ha and is matured in 70% new oak barrels, there are no amphoras this year as Marielle Cazaux felt the wine needed the micro-oxygenation. It has a very pure nose with black cherries, blueberry and wild strawberry fruit, just a little Burgundy-like in style. A hint of orange rind loiters in the background. The palate is medium-bodied with filigree tannins, a silver thread of acidity, quite linear and strict on the entry, gentle grip with a dash of black pepper towards the finish. A second glass that happened to have been opened for an hour revealed some of its opulence that will surely be enhanced during the élevage. It will deserve four to five years in bottle but will have a long life ahead and will give a lot of pleasure.
Austere on the opening, takes a beat then shows a creamy character as it opens. In colour, like so many you will find a vivid ink, followed by traces of gourmet cocoa bean, damson, chalk, rose petal, slate and crayon. Clay and gravel soils here have been worked organically and biodynamically for many years, 70% new oak for ageing, 3.66ph. Overall harvest August 28 to September 17. 30hl/h yield. Marielle Cazeaux director. A clear contender for an upscore in bottle.
The 2025 La Conseillante is another brilliant wine in the making for this Pomerol reference point. Wafting from the glass with aromas of ripe mulberries and blackberries mingled with hints of violets and truffle, it's medium- to full-bodied, deep and unctuous, with lively acids, ultra-refined tannins and a long, floral finish. It's a blend of 87% Merlot, 10% Cabernet Franc and 3% Cabernet Sauvignon (from new plantings that already make it into the blend) that attained 13.5% alcohol. Fermentations were capped at 26 degrees Celsius, the coolest ever, to extract selectively, and the entire production is maturing in barriques this year.