Domaine Auguste Clape, Cornas 'Renaissance' Syrah 2023

Auguste Clape was the first grower in Cornas to bottle his own wine, back in 1957, and in doing so he set the standard the whole appellation still measures itself against. The Clape family have farmed the steep, terraced slopes above the Rhône for generations, and today Auguste's son Pierre-Marie and grandson Olivier carry the estate forward with the same quiet discipline. Eight hectares, all on those famous granite terraces, all farmed by hand because there is no other way to work land this steep.

'Renaissance' is Clape's more open, earlier-drinking cuvée, made from the domaine's younger vines, in plots twenty to twenty five years old, so young only by Clape standards. It follows the same traditional winemaking as the flagship Cornas: whole cluster fermentation with native yeasts, long ageing in large neutral foudres, no new oak, ever. The result is a wine that shows the hallmark seriousness of the house, just a little sooner.