A benchmark Super Tuscan from Marchesi Antinori, the 2017 Solaia delivers power and elegance in equal measure. Aromas of blackberry, cassis, lavender and spice lead into a rich, polished palate with refined tannins and vibrant freshness. Awarded up to 97 points by both James Suckling and Decanter, this is a structured, age-worthy vintage with excellent balance. Approachable from 2025, with long-term cellaring potential.

James Suckling | JS 97
Published: Aug 17, 2020

Extremely aromatic with sage, lavender, blackberries and currants. Full-bodied with chewy and very polished tannins that melt into the wine. Foursquare and slightly austere. Fresh and well framed. A wine that needs five to six years to soften and come together completely. Try after 2025. 

Decanter | D 97
Published: Aug 25, 2020

Super-restrained cassis fruit with an almost blueberry maturity in front of violet, clove and blond tobacco spiciness. Retasting the wine the next day, it shines with graphite minerality, pure leather, and a touch of lemon thyme. Creamy and full on the palate, it has refined and meaty tannins, with lively acidity and great balance overall. You would not think this wine was aged in 100% new French oak for 18 months because of the great fruit concentration on display, but the top quality of the oak used is evident. The potential of Solaia is to be seen over the years, to discover its character as it matures. It's never cutesy, always elegant.

The Wine Advocate | RP 95
Published: Aug 30, 2020
Drink: 2021-2040

The Marchesi Antinori 2017 Solaia offers a uniquely floral personality with wild rose and lilac that comes as a surprise, especially if you are expecting the more robust and opulent dark fruit associated with this vintage. To use a word that is popular now, the aromas are absolutely lifted. This is a bouquet-driven wine, showing great oak choices that are synergistic with the light and considerably thinner palate. Dried or pressed flowers cede to cherry, blueberry, some red meat char and a light touch of cinnamon. My impression is that the dry extract from the oak ultimately plays a bigger role in the overall flavor profile, preserving its red fruit core nevertheless. The wine is very accessible in terms of mouthfeel, showing a comparatively thinner and shorter approach. With more time in the glass, it offers some of the white soil dust that is a standard Solaia signature. It will be released the first week of September.

Wine writers like myself tend to refer to 2017 as a "hot" vintage, but we stand corrected by winemakers who choose the word "dry" instead. In truth, the 2017 growing season was both hot and dry, but the lack of moisture in the atmosphere and in the soils is ultimately what had a lasting impact on the vintage. It pushed concentration, color and flavor extract, resulting in visibly smaller, dark berries and raisins with thicker skins and a reduced ratio of watery pulp inside the berries.

Indeed, the growing season kicked off with a frost event on April 23-24 that damaged fruit. Following the frost and the drought, yields for the vintage were reduced by as much as one-third at the Tenuta Tignanello, where the Antinori team farms fruit for Solaia, and in much of the rest of the Chianti Classico region. In a vintage such as 2017, the gap between sugar ripeness and phenolic ripeness is enlarged, creating difficult water to navigate for those seeking to achieve balance in their wines.

The expertise of a vintner comes into play in a vintage like 2017. Renzo Cotarella, managing director at Marchesi Antinori, goes over some of the strategies employed by his team in 2017. For one, skin contact during fermentation was reduced to about 12 to 14 days, as opposed to the 20 days of maceration seen in the previous year (the 100-point 2016 vintage). The fruit came in dark, so there was no need to extract further. Pump-overs were replaced with punch-downs that tend to be extra soft and fluid, especially in the conical-shaped fermenters used at the Solaia winery. The tiny element of Cabernet Franc was increased to 7% in this vintage, climbing up from 5% in past editions. That increased Cabernet Franc works to increase freshness and the so-called "fruit energy" of the wine. The grape also delivers sweeter tannins, thus taking away from some of the astringency of the two principal grapes used in this blend. These are of course Cabernet Sauvignon and Sangiovese. In a sense, the added Cabernet Franc serves to make vintages such as 2017 less tannic. "Cabernet Franc is really the key to a vintage like 2017," says Mr. Cotarella.

The wine completes its malolactic fermentation in neutral barrique, left over from the previous year. All new barrel acquisitions are made after the harvest. This is important in a year such as 2017, because Cotarella and his team can opt for the sweeter tannins of coopers Remond or Taransaud and match their oak selections to the vintage.

In a nutshell, the 2017 Solaia is a balanced, albeit more accessible, wine. The bouquet offers robust dark fruit and plum, and the mouthfeel is silky and streamlined.

Jancis Robinson | JR 17.5
Published: Sep 2, 2020
Drink: 2022-2035

72% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Sangiovese, 8% Cabernet Franc. A cold April that reduced yields, followed by a hot, dry summer with temperatures regularly over 30 °C throughout August. September rains a reprieve to help stressed vines finish ripening the grapes.
Deep ruby. Glossy, ripe, sweet with black-fruit sweetness on the nose. Softness and ripeness are the two dominant factors here. Oily richness on the palate, a big juicy glob of fruit in the middle. Good acidity keeps things in check. Full-bodied and muscular, but held together nicely. Long and spicy on the finish. (TP)