Niepoort, Quinta da Lomba Garrafeira Tinto, 2016

Est. delivery 2-3 weeks

The Rothschilds in Bordeaux, Madame Lalou Bize-Leroy in Burgundy, Madame Barbe-Nicole Clicquot in Champagne, Angelo Gaja in Piedmont, Serge Hochar in Lebanon, Edouardo Chadwick in Chile... towering figures whose impact and importance to their respective wine regions ensures their names are the very first mentioned in association. To these and others we must surely add Portugal’s Dirk Niepoort, one of the most visionary and pioneering winemakers working today, honoured as such as the 2023 recipient of Decanter’s vaunted “Hall of Fame” Award.

Having just increased his reviewing brief to include the wines of Portugal, in his very first article, The Wine Advocate’s Luis Gutiérrez focuses heavily on Dirk Niepoort, whom he describes as "the most influential person in Portuguese wine—a pioneer, visionary, leader and ambassador. A person I deeply admire." In charting Portugal’s fine wine evolution (revolution?), he declares “to me, the engine of Portuguese wine is Niepoort” adding “the table wines, a game to which they are very new (1990), compared with the Port business, are better than ever.” He backs this up with exceptional scores: Of the 255 wines reviewed for the piece, the top 10 (96+ to 100 points) are all Niepoort.

The Dão region is higher and cooler than the Douro, with more granitic souls, and the first releases (2016) from Niepoort’s Quinta da Lomba. Including grapes from vines over 120 years old from sites up to 700m altitude, both red and white are matured in old oak for four years and a further year in bottle prior to release. Described as “really impressive” by Gutiérrez, these are surely the finest from the region and destined to become as iconic as the Niepoort’s Douro wines.