L'If

L'If, St Emilion, 2019

Name: L'If, St Emilion
Brand: L'If
Price: 983.12 GBP

95/100

The Wine Independent

95/100

Vinous

Available Vintages

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2019
6x75cl
DP
£983.12

Justerini & Brooks Tasting note

"The vintage’s weather conditions prompted nature to offer up particularly concentrated fruit with hugely fresh aromas. L’If 2019 with its significant proportion of Cabernet Franc (25%) boasts a dense, silky structure and is reasonably classical in style.” - Jacques Thienpont Terroir: limestone-clay plateau and hillside over an asteriated limestone rock subsoil. Clay hillside over Agenais molasses subsoil. Limestone-clay hillside over Fronsac molasses subsoil. Area: 8 ha (7 ha in production in 2019). Average age of vines: 40 years. Production: approx. 7,500 bottles. Cultivation practices: tilling, natural and seeded grass cover. Vineyard renewal programme: replanting individual massal selection vines at a higher density. Numerous interventions by hand (disbudding, leaf thinning, crop thinning etc.). Maturation: 12 to 16 months (50% in new barrels, 50% second-fill). 2019 blend: • 75% Merlot (harvested 23rd September to 4th October) • 25% Cabernet Franc (8th October).

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GUARANTEED PROVENANCE

Provenance in fine wine

When it comes to purchasing wine, provenance is of upmost importance. A wine’s history – where it’s sourced from and how it’s been stored – can have an enormous influence on the eventual enjoyment it provides. At Justerini & Brooks, we can trace nearly every case back to the domaine, estate or Château it originally came from; we ship from over 200 wine producers throughout the world.

Wines not bought directly from the vineyard are either sourced from trusted suppliers, with whom we share the same philosophy and rigour in buying, or from our own network of Cellarers customers. These customers’ wines are stored in optimal conditions in Octavian Corsham and, in the vast majority of cases, have been stored by us since the wine was first shipped. We do not purchase wine from auctions.

We feel it is equally important to for our customers that the case they buy and leave in storage with us is exactly the same case they subsequently have delivered. This may sound obvious and straightforward, yet we are one of very few merchants to have taken measures to ensure this.

We have created a system where every case is independent, thereby ensuring a trail of ownership and peace of mind for every customer.

The Journey

Justerinis ensures that every case of wine stored with Cellarers (Wines) Ltd has a unique identifier and customer’s name, almost unheard of in the industry as it is expensive to administer. These details are printed and placed on every case which is logged and recorded under your account name and kept in the world’s most renowned storage facility, Octavian Corsham.

This information is sent from our systems to the warehouse every day to ensure the trail of ownership is verified and upheld.

While customer reserves are stored in Corsham, our physical stocks are kept in Hoddesdon, further providing a geographical separation between customers’ wines with Cellarers and Justerinis’ own stock.

Further Reassurance

Cellarers (Wines) Ltd is a legally separate limited company from Justerini & Brooks which currently holds approximately £450 million worth of customer reserves. It is fully insured to catastrophic loss. Many merchants will state that wine in their care is fully insured, but in reality this is on an individual case basis with insufficient cover for total loss as this is prohibitively expensive. The cover provided by Octavian and Justerini & Brooks is unmatched.

Cellarers (Wines) Ltd is audited by PwC every year.

Critic Reviews

95/100

Lisa Perrotti-Brown,

The Wine Independent

A blend of 70% Merlot and 30% Cabernet Franc, the 2019 L'If is deep garnet-purple in color. The nose is quite closed to begin, needing a lot of swirling to bring out notes of black cherry preserves, black raspberries, and licorice, with hints of roses and raspberries. The medium to full-bodied palate has a rock-solid structure of grainy tannins and bold freshness supporting the muscular fruit, finishing long and perfumed.

drinking window 2027 - 2044

date of review 05/2023

95/100

Neal Martin,

Vinous

The 2019 L'If has an almost Left Bank nose with copious graphite scents percolating through the black fruit, very focused and energetic. The palate is medium-bodied with sappy black fruit, finely tuned, ripe and sensual with ample freshness on the cedar and mineral infused finish. Wonderful. Tasted blind at the Southwold annual tasting.

drinking window 2025 - 2050

date of review 02/2023

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14.5%

allergen information

This product may contain sulphites. Full allergen information is available upon request, please call our Customer Relations Team on +44 (0)20 7484 6430.