
I was exhilarated after the 2021 Barolo barrel tasting
This was what grower Giuseppe Vajra said to me in October 2024, and it also describes exactly how I felt after a week of tasting the wines! The 2021s are invigorating and precise, offering a detailed insight into the sub-regional differences across this magical part of Italy.
While I share Giuseppe’s wish that we could love each vintage for its own beauty, rather than ranking and rating, it is important to emphasise just how exciting the 2021 vintage is. The 2021s nudge us towards comparisons with 2016 and 2019 with their great complexity, length and structure. However, they also have an extra dimension: a ripe, rich generosity, supported by powerful yet wonderfully handled tannins and balanced by vibrant freshness.
The wines
Order by midday, Friday 31st January
For me, this is the best vintage since 2016, and in some cases, it surpasses it. Silvano Bolmida, who makes our Exhibition Barolo, believes that 2021 ‘will become the next 2016’, while Cesare Benvenuto of Pio Cesare calls it ‘a very complete vintage’.
I am thrilled to have the opportunity to offer you my pick of the wines ahead of their release to market, and thanks to a favourable exchange rate, we are delighted to keep prices the same as last year.
Visiting growers with The Society’s former Italy buyer Sebastian Payne MW, two Italian words emerged that helped to convey the 2021 vintage. They are not directly translatable into English, but I’m going to try to define the concepts behind them. The first came from Fabio Alessandria, fifth-generation winemaker of Comm. G.B. Burlotto, who was explaining that 2021 has both fruit and structure. He landed on the word ciccia, which indicates the ‘flesh’ of the 2021 and also its force. The second was suggested by Franco Massolino: grinta, expressing the wines’ drive and energy. These qualities, along with the 2021s’ inherent balance, suggest amazing ageing potential. Many should be patiently cellared, but I have been sure to highlight those that will be approachable earlier.
The growing season
According to the growers we visited, 2021 might even be called ‘perfect’. When I asked Maurizio Anselma to describe the year to me, he didn’t miss a beat: ‘it was the sun coming back’. He was in the middle of a tough, wet 2024 harvest, and the memory of this much easier year meant his face lit up.
The growing season began with good water reserves, thanks to high levels of winter rainfall and snowmelt – ideal for the vines to draw on in the dry months that followed. The only significant, but very localised, threat was early spring frost; otherwise, it was a year of no excesses. September was particularly great – warm in the day, fresh at night – leading to a later ripening than in 2020.
The wines
The 2021s are, as Franco Massolino said, ‘Barolo with a capital B’: they have real identity and transmit the personalities of their respective sites so clearly. Tino Colla of Poderi Colla articulated it well: ‘serious wines speak dialect.’
In general, it can be helpful to think of Barolo’s different expressions in terms of east to west. The older, poorer, more clay- and sandstone-based soils of the east yield a more densely structured style, which can need many years to unfurl. By contrast, the vineyards in the west of Barolo (planted on blue-grey marl) create more perfumed, fruit-driven wines that tend to be approachable earlier. The central areas can give us something of both styles.
An Exhilarating Vintage – Insights from Victoria Mason MW
