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Château Angelus unveils special bottle design for the ‘majestic’ 2022 vintage

14 February 2024 By Colin Hay

Château Angelus has marked the 2022 vintage, its 240th anniversary and the year it entered a new era under Stéphanie de Boüard-Rivoal, with a specially designed bottle for the “majestic” vintage.

In 2022, 240 years after the birth of the estate and a decade after the handover from Hubert de Boüard de Laforest to Stéphanie de Boüard-Rivoal, Château Angelus entered a new era. To mark this occasion the property took the opportunity of Vinexpo in Paris to unveil to the assembled international wine press a special bottle design for the ‘majestic’ 2022 vintage.

As Stéphanie de Boüard-Rivoal explained, “From the first tastings, the 2022 vintage of Château Angelus took its place among the most successful vintages the estate has ever seen. Rarely in the history of Angelus has the de Boüard de Laforest family come so close to the ideal of excellence that guides and inspires their winemaking. Named ‘Le Majestueux’, this new vintage literally rubs shoulders with the stars”.

One of the explanations for this prodigious performance lies in the estate’s emblematic Cabernet Franc, which showed unprecedented resistance to drought, enabling it to retain – whilst bringing to the final blend – a remarkable degree of freshness, energy and tension.

It was this that inspired the decision to place the 2022 vintage in a special bottle. “After ten years at the pinnacle of Saint-Émilion wines, the time had come for Château Angelus to pursue its unique path by freeing itself from certain normative constraints, and to enter another dimension, that of a history entirely determined by infinitely demanding standards and a quest for excellence down to the smallest detail,” says Stéphanie de Boüard-Rivoal, Chairwoman of Angelus.

Exactly ten years on from the now iconic black and gold bottle for the 2012 vintage, the bottle for the 2022 vintage once again adopts the tradition of the jeweller’s craft, with a complex technical process enabling real gold (20 carat) and mother-of-pearl to be literally printed onto the glass.

Tasting note (en primeur):

Angélus 2022 (Saint-Émilion; 60% Merlot; 40% Cabernet Franc; for the first time we find in the final blend Merlot from what was previously Château Bellevue; tasted at the property en primeur with Stéphanie de Boüard-Rivoal). So dark fruited and so pure, with loads of Cabernet Franc character. Subtle, a little restrained aromatically at this nascent stage and slightly intimate in character, even – you have to come to it. Blueberries, wild bilberry, mulberry and a touch of black cherry and black cherry skin. There’s also the gracious leafiness of the Cabernet Franc – green herbal notes and redcurrant and black currant leaf. The oak is almost imperceptible oak, gently supporting everything and bringing with it a touch of spice and that distinctive rose peppercorn note but nothing more obvious. With air, the cassis notes build on the palate. This is brilliantly textured and layered and fantastically pixilated in a manner than only calcaire tannins seems to be able to achieve. It is ample, broad and velvety-textured but with a gracious mirror-pool and polished glass mid-palate. The tannins are so soft and when they start to grip they release the cedar-charged juicy sapidity (the first time we encounter the cedar). Very delineated. Very composed, Quite majestic. 97-99.