2018 Solena Estate Grande Cuvee Pinot Noir Willamette Valley is sold out.

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2018 Solena Estate Grande Cuvee Pinot Noir Willamette Valley 750 ml

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  • Curated by unrivaled experts
  • Choose your delivery date
  • Temperature controlled shipping options
  • Get credited back if a wine fails to impress

New Vintage of Top 100 Pinot Bottling

Early last spring in the Willamette Valley, Laurent Montalieu told us he “had something for us,” and proceeded to pour his Soléna Estate Grande Cuvée Pinot Noir—which held its own with Pinots five times the price.

That wine went on to become far and away our top selling Pinot Noir of the year—Burgundy, Sonoma County, Santa Barbara, the Grande Cuvée topped them all, bar none. That’s why we and our members are thrilled about the newest vintage of the wildly popular Soléna Estate Grande Cuvée, which we have for $24—well under the winery’s $30 SRP.

The 2018 Soléna has a deep ruby red core with a tinge of magenta at the rim. Layers of red cherry, plum, and earth lead to lush and floral aromas of fresh red roses, violets, and bramble. It’s all rounded out by baking spice and a hint of vanilla, melding into a long and delicious finish. 

Whether you partook in Laurent Montalieu’s masterful 2017 or this will be your first taste of Soléna’s fantastic Pinots, this is your shot at the 2018 vintage, up to a full third off of SRP.

Laurent and Danielle Montalieu putting out an over-delivering Pinot Noir isn’t news: Their Grande Cuvée has placed at #38 on Wine Spectator’s Top 100 wines in the world, and vintage after vintage, this bottling has few peers in the value department. That’s why it has become a perpetual sellout at Wine Access, and led us to rethink the term “quality-to-price ratio”—and start referring to Soléna’s quality-to-price disparity.

Part of this is doubtless because of unparalleled access to top Willamette Valley fruit. Over his 32 years in Oregon, Laurent has put together a collection of vineyards that provide stunning fruit from all over the Willamette Valley: the 80 acre Soléna estate, of course, as well as Domaine Danielle Laurent in Yamhill-Carlton, and the Hyland Vineyard in McMinnville. These sources guarantee that grapes that would likely compose expensive vineyard-designate Pinots find their way into the Grande Cuvée.

When it comes to “quality, complexity, and price, there is no finer value in the world,” Laurent once told us. The ever-modest Laurent was talking about Willamette Pinot Noir in general, but we think his words describe the Grande Cuvée quite nicely—especially in the season that Vinous, in an article titled “Oregon: An Embarrassment of Riches and Richness,” noted is one of an “unprecedented chain of outstanding vintages in the Willamette Valley.” 

Sourced from four vineyards in the beautiful 2018 vintage—Hyland and the biodynamically farmed Danielle Laurent, as well as the cool-climate Westmount Vineyard and Domaine Loubejac near the breezy Van Duzer Corridor—the grapes are aged in 100% second- and third-fill French oak barrels, which impart a nice, gentle touch of oak baking spice and vanilla, a perfect accent for the Pinot’s lively red fruit.

It all adds up to one of our most popular Pinots ever. We’re glad it’s back, and we’re far from the only ones.