Mind-Blowing Cult Rhys Pinot 60% Less ⭐️ "Burgundy Rival, Seriously Gorgeous"
|
Fractured Shale · Native Yeast · Foot-Trodden · 10% New Oak · 13.8%
|
|
A Personal Note
Dear Artisans, There are very few estates anywhere that carry the words “world class” without an argument breaking out. Rhys Vineyards is one of them. Kevin Harvey walked away from software and venture capital and spent twenty years chasing one idea — that what makes a Burgundian Grand Cru is not the postcode but the shallow soil over fractured rock underneath it. Then he went and found that rock in California and planted it. In December of 2023, Antonio Galloni named Rhys his Winery of the Year. Elin McCoy had already called these Pinots the closest thing yet to a California version of great Burgundy. Eric Asimov got there before either of them. If California has a Grand Cru address, this is my vote for it. Today I have something odd to offer you: the same wine, at half the price, wearing the wrong label. The bottle is the 2019 Rhys Anderson Valley Pinot Noir. The label says Anderson Valley, which sounds like a blend of everything Rhys owns up there. It is not. In 2019 the wine was 100% Bearwallow Vineyard fruit, and the Wine Advocate says so in its own review: “Composed entirely of Bearwallow Vineyard fruit.” Bearwallow sits in the Deep End of Anderson Valley on ten to twenty-five inches of topsoil over deep fractured shale, at three to six hundred feet. Put the vineyard’s name on the front label and the bottle costs $80 to $110. Leave the appellation on the label instead — and it costs thirty-nine ninety-nine. Same fruit, same cellar, same hands, half the money, and exploding from your glass right now. We sold thirty cases of this in the past year and almost every one of them was a repeat order. It has gone out to the highest-profile events our cult-Pinot collectors put on — which is not a sentence I get to write about a forty-dollar bottle. We squeezed our partners for a final drop and thirty-six bottles arrive tomorrow. There is nothing behind them.
|
The Market Anomaly
One vineyard,
|
| Bearwallow Vineyard Fruit · What It Costs | Price |
|
Rhys "Bearwallow Vineyard" Pinot Noir 2018
Last Listed Price, Now Sold Out
|
$109.99 |
|
Rhys "Anderson Valley" Pinot Noir 2019
100% Bearwallow Fruit · Here, Tomorrow
|
$39.99 |
Twenty years of
the same verdict.
|
“The 2021s at Rhys are off the charts… wines that capture a pinnacle of achievement for the work that has gone into making Rhys one of California’s most highly regarded wineries.” Antonio Galloni · Winery Of The Year
Vinous · December 20th, 2023
|
|
“Two decades into its existence, Rhys is proof-positive that any perceived chasm between Burgundy, California or elsewhere is as much about meticulous planning and obsessive attention to detail as raw materials and potential.” Matthew Luczy
Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate · August 21st, 2024
|
|
“The closest yet to a California version of great Burgundy.” Elin McCoy
Bloomberg · March 20th, 2015
|
|
“Among the best American Pinot Noirs, a beacon for those who value grace, balance, structure and distinctiveness in wine.” Eric Asimov
The New York Times
|
|
“Rhys is world class. It’s as simple as that.” Antonio Galloni
Vinous
|
| ★ 36 Bottles Arrive Friday |
Rhys Vineyards
"Anderson Valley" Pinot Noir 2019
Rhys selection massale vines on the Wolfey-Bearwallow series: ten to twenty-five inches of topsoil sitting on deep fractured shale, three to six hundred feet up. Hand-harvested, five percent whole cluster, five-day cold soak, native yeast, foot-trodden twice a day through fermentation. Eighteen months in barrel with only ten percent new oak, fifteen of those months on the lees.
Three reviews on the 2019 and two of them are 93s. What every critic notices is the restraint — nobody reaches for words like plush or opulent. They reach for precision, minerality, beetroot, woodsmoke, soil. This is the Burgundian end of California Pinot, made by someone who went looking for the rock first.
|
93
Wine Advocate
|
93
John Gilman
|
91
Jeb Dunnuck
|
|
Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate
93 Points
"The 2019 Pinot Noir Anderson Valley is herbal and forest-driven on the nose, with a distinct note of beets emanating from its core. The palate offers silky precision and pure red fruit flavors, concluding with a deftly structured, upright finish. Composed entirely of Bearwallow Vineyard fruit, this is a charming introduction to the northern reaches of Rhys’s holdings." |
|
John Gilman · View From The Cellar
93 Points
"Gorgeous and one of the best wines I have yet tasted sold under the Alesia label from Rhys Vineyards. The bouquet is pure, youthful and beautifully precise, offering up scents of black cherries, pomegranate, a hint of beetroot, gamebird, woodsmoke, a superb base of soil tones, fresh herbs, espresso and a nice touch of cedary oak. On the palate the wine is full-bodied, focused, tangy and displays outstanding mid-palate depth… ripe, suave tannins and a long, vibrant and nascently complex finish. A very serious bottle of pinot in the making!" Drink 2028-2060 |
|
Jeb Dunnuck
91 Points
"The 2019 Pinot Noir Anderson Valley comes from the Anderson Valley sites and can be thought of as an introduction to the style and quality of this estate. Medium ruby-hued, it has medium-bodied aromas and flavors of mulled cherries, roasted herbs, loamy soil, and baking spices. These all carry to a medium-bodied Pinot Noir that has plenty of structure, good balance, and outstanding length." |
|
Allen Meadows’ Burghound
Tasting Note
"A pretty and restrained array features notes of red and dark pinot fruit, spice and a hint of tea character. The rich, succulent and lush medium-bodied flavors possess a suave mid-palate texture that contrasts somewhat with the moderately firm and sneaky long finish." |
| Elsewhere $50.00 Our Price |
$39.99 |
36 Bottles Arriving Friday, August 14th
| Reserve The 2019 → |
Rhys "Alesia" Pinot Noir 2016
Magnum, 1.5 Litres
The same wine three vintages earlier, under the Alesia name it used to carry, in the only format that genuinely ages better than a bottle. William Kelley of the Wine Advocate confirms the fruit: “This vintage hails entirely from Kevin Harvey’s Bearwallow Vineyard.”
At ten years old this is the one to open on the night rather than cellar. Kelley called it “unabashedly delicious” and expected a decade of drinking from it, which puts us right in the middle of the window. A magnum pours ten generous glasses. There are two of them.
|
91
Wine Advocate
|
90
Jeb Dunnuck
|
|
Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate · William Kelley
91 Points
"The 2016 Alesia Pinot Noir Anderson Valley is unabashedly delicious, bursting with fragrant aromas of dried flowers, raspberries, wild plums and sweet forest floor. On the palate, the wine is medium-bodied, supple and satiny, with a juicy core of succulent, mouthwatering fruit that’s framed by melting tannins. This bottling is already expressive, and I’d expect it to drink well for a decade, perhaps more. Note that this vintage hails entirely from Kevin Harvey’s Bearwallow Vineyard." May 31st, 2018 |
|
Jeb Dunnuck
90 Points
"Offering up a darker style in its pomegranate, cherries, leafy herbs, and underbrush aromatics, it’s medium-bodied, has plenty of density and oomph on the palate, ripe tannins, and a great finish. It’s a great introduction into the wines of this estate." February 14th, 2019 |
|
Vinous · Antonio Galloni
Tasting Note
"The 2016 Pinot Noir (Anderson Valley) is soft, supple and open-knit, with lovely fruit purity and terrific overall balance. Sweet red cherry and rose petal are pushed forward in a racy, succulent Pinot Noir that expresses the allure of Anderson Valley quite nicely." August 2018 |
| Elsewhere $135.00 Our Price |
$109.97 |
Only 2 Magnums Left
| Order The Magnum → |
Thirty-six bottles,
and two magnums.
Thirty-six bottles, Friday the fourteenth. We are taking orders now and they go out the day they land.
John Gilman called this “a very serious bottle of pinot in the making” and gave it a drinking window that runs to 2060 — so buy two, open one this autumn with a roast chicken and put the other one somewhere dark. Seven years on it is already generous, but the interesting part of its life is still ahead of it.
And if you want to do the thing properly, we have two magnums of the 2016 left. Same vineyard, same wine, ten years of age on it and the format that ages best of all. When those two are gone that is the end of Rhys in this shop for a while.
Cheers and all my best,
— James Tran
| Reserve The 2019 Rhys → |
36 Bottles Arriving Friday, August 14th · $39.99
Call 650-917-8080, text 650-880-3553, email sales@artisan.wine, or chat with us
Leave a comment