2015 Xavier Vignon Arcane XIX Le Soleil Côtes-du-Rhône Villages 750 ml

One of our first calls of the 2021 was to Xavier Vignon—his Arcane XIX Le Soleil had to be one of our first Rhône offers of the year. Called “sensationally seductive” by Wine Advocate, this red is one of the magazine’s most highly-rated under $30 wines in a decade.

Raised from Wine Spectator’s 97-point 2015 vintage in the Southern Rhône, few Rhône blends are as exquisite than Xavier Vignon’s Arcane Le Soleil, a Wine-Access member-favorite priced for every day, but with the stuffing and “seriously savory character” (to borrow from Parker) to last the next decade. Order accordingly.  

As Robert Parker noted on his first visit chez Vignon in 2008, Xavier Vignon is a magician in the cellar, and it rarely shows more so than in the 2015 Soleil. The winemaker left the components on the skins for more than a month during fermentation, before leaving the wine in a combination of Austrian Stockinger barrels, concrete vats, and large foudres for 15 months. He finally bottled in March of 2017. 

Now, after more than three years of bottle aging, Le Soleil has shed its baby fat and is just beginning to put on a show. Suave and almost brooding, the high-elevation plantings and those spindly ancient vines have taken center stage, accounting both for the luscious dark red fruit concentration, fine acidity, and the “silky” tannins so accurately cited in Parker’s Advocate.

Nearly a year ago to the day, we sat at Xavier and Isabelle Vignon’s dinner table in Barroux. The wine had been uncorked two hours before, then poured into a tall Riedel carafe. As Isabelle carved the épaule de porc, Xavier poured the deep purple-black Le Soleil and explained why the torrid summer of 2015 and the subsequent September provided a near-perfect growing script for this lavish ancient-vine blend.  

“The 2015 growing season was a story in two parts,” Xavier explained almost poetically. “We used to think that vintages like 1990, 2005 and 2007 were hot, but by comparison, both were cool compared to 2015. The heat began in June and didn’t let up until mid-August. Barely a drop of rain. In the region, people like to say that 2015 was a great vintage uniformly, but that’s not true.”

He went on: “The young vines without deep root structure really suffered from the heat, and then just couldn’t process the ferocity of the storms. But the really old head-trained vines, and particularly those planted in cooler, high altitude locales, took full advantage of the heat. Then it was as if a most patient conductor, waiting to the last minute, gave a cue, and the skies opened up, quenching the thirst of the 100-year-old Grenache and old-vine Syrah and Mourvèdre. We harvested patiently, picking each of the nine parcels over a three-week period. Picking was a pleasure. It was as if the bunches just fell off the vine into the small bins. It was really a magical harvest for Soleil and for the vendangeurs.”  

Magical for the red wine lover too.