2016 Chateau Palmer Margaux 750 ml

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100 pts

Antonio Galloni

Technical Director Thomas Duroux and his team made one of the most brilliant wines of the 2016 vintage. Palmer is simply exceptional. Rich and dramatically sweeping in the glass, the 2016 is breathtaking. All the elements simply fall into place in a wine of mesmerizing beauty. The counterpoint of dark, sumptuous fruit and floral notes makes for an utterly compelling Palmer that will take its place among the estate’s finest vintages. Dark cherry, lavender, spice and mocha are some of the many notes that build into a deep, substantial finish that is truly unforgettable. In a word: magnificent!

100 pts

Jeb Dunnuck

The finest vintage I’ve ever tasted from this estate, surpassing the 2009 and 2010, the 2016 Château Palmer is a blend of 47% each of Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, with the balance Petit Verdot, all of which was brought up in 65% new French oak. This magical effort reveals a saturated purple color as well as a huge nose of crème de cassis, graphite, crushed rocks, and spring flowers, and it develops beautifully with time in the glass. Full-bodied, deep, incredibly concentrated and powerful, it nevertheless just glides over the palate with flawless purity and balance, present, ripe tannins, and a finish that just won’t quit. This is Bordeaux at its most regal and classic. It will be drinkable with just 4-5 years of bottle age and keep for half a century.

100 pts

Wine Enthusiast

Cellar Selection. Powerful tannins and hugely rich fruit balance together in this superb wine. The velvet texture belies the power behind the concentrated, ripe black-fruit flavor, with vibrant acidity giving ample lift. The wine’s structure will ensure aging for many years. Drink from 2024.

100 pts

Jane Anson

Just hover your nose over the glass to get excited about this wine. Inky purple in colour, cigar box, tobacco bud, pencil lead, tight cassis and bilberry fruit. Where the 2015 is generous, the 2016 is tighter, less expressive at the five year mark, but with layers and potential to fire up an entire room. Has the structure and the chiselled fruit that signposts great Bordeaux in an exceptional vintage, with the nuanced whisper of violet and peony that takes you to the Margaux appellation. Powerful and muscular, still austere but the morieish juice on the finish tells you how much this has to give over the next few decades.

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Perfect Any Way You Look at It

Palmer occupies a strange and enviable place in Bordeaux. On paper, it is a Third Growth, ranked in 1855 below the First and Second Growths of the Médoc. In the glass, it has spent the better part of a century making that ranking look like a clerical error, which is why collectors and sommeliers routinely file it among the First Growths.

Part of what sets Palmer apart is the blend. The estate plants an unusually high proportion of Merlot on its finest gravel, roughly matching its Cabernet Sauvignon—a near-even split that is rare on the Left Bank and gives Palmer its signature perfume and silk. The 2016 is 47% Merlot, 47% Cabernet Sauvignon, and 6% Petit Verdot.

Since 2004, the estate has been run by CEO Thomas Duroux, a protégé of the Mondavi family who previously oversaw Tuscany’s Ornellaia. Bespectacled and soft-spoken, he is a quiet innovator unafraid to test hidebound Médoc tradition. When he was first called in to interview, he showed up in jeans.

Duroux converted Palmer to biodynamic farming, matching his methods to the roughly 20 distinct soil types he mapped across the property. The result has been a run of vintages that balance richness with freshness, power with grace.

The 2016 tested that resolve. A mild, wet winter and a rainy spring brought punishing mildew pressure—130 millimeters of rain fell in a single month—before summer turned dry and warm and held through a long, late harvest.

What came out of it is exactly the sort of wine that makes Palmer’s reputation: saturated and deep, with crème de cassis, graphite, crushed rock, and spring flowers giving way to dark cherry, violet, and mocha, all of it gliding across the palate with the purity and lift that mark a great Margaux.

2016 Chateau Palmer Margaux 750 ml

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