Description
Gianluigi Lano, Barbaresco “Rocche Massalupo”
It doesn’t matter where you shop: Bottles like this only come around a few times each year. The jaw-dropping quality, “sweet spot” evolution, and $49 asking price for blue-chip Barbaresco (among the world’s most respected luxury brands) makes Lano’s “Rocche Massalupo” one of 2022s most mesmerizing offers. More importantly, it’s an undeniably brilliant investment for you because it’s destined to outclass the majority of $75-$100 competition and effortlessly out-live them in the cellar.
Aside from inheriting Barbaresco’s “luxury brand,” it seems Gianluigi Lano’s single-vineyard showpiece has transformed into a brand of its own: We’ve actually watched firsthand as the sommelier community got behind this new discovery and allowed the momentum to independently blossom. Right around the time we offered the first vintage years ago, it simultaneously began lighting up top wine lists in Northern California. First, a coveted by-the-glass honor at The French Laundry. Next, a luminous star turn at San Francisco’s Quince/Cotogna/Verjus mini-empire. And, just like that, Lano seemed to have made the leap from relative obscurity to coveted status symbol! The explanation for all this hysteria isn’t complicated: With intense perfume, concentrated soil character, unhurried winemaking, and a magnificent, “potentially historic vintage” as Antonio Galloni puts it, today’s 2016 is an exceptional expression of the hallowed Barbaresco terroir. I encourage you to enjoy a bottle immediately, only if you promise to stash the others deep in your cellar. Having enjoyed bottles of Lano from the early 2000s, I can assure you this beauty is built to last!
The Rocche Massolupo cru sits at the southern edge of the Barbaresco growing zone, as does the Lano family cantina, in the village of San Rocco Seno d’Elvio. Were you to drive through this little town it’s likely the naturally farmed and relatively wild-looking Lano vineyards would catch your eye: synthetic pesticides, fertilizers, and herbicides are all forbidden, so don’t expect one of those neatly manicured tracts with nothing but dirt under the vine rows. The soils here are alive and un-manipulated, producing pristine grapes that are given the most traditional, minimalist treatment in the cellar—and yes, you most certainly can taste it! Exceedingly pretty, silky, and evoking both mineral-rich earth and ripe, sun-kissed fruit, this is what people mean when they call Barbaresco the “queen” to Barolo’s “king.” As history has shown us time and again, it’s often the Queen who truly reigns supreme—and, aside from a few top-tier restaurants, you won’t encounter Lano’s wines often (if at all) in the US market.
Working with vineyards handed down from his father, Gianluigi Lano only began bottling wines under his own label in the early 1990s. Assisted by his wife, Daniela, and son, Samuele, he has made organic farming a priority and obtained certification a few years ago. The family produces a concise lineup of wines, including two Barbarescos, with today’s hailing from the only cru vineyard, Rocche Massalupo, that belongs entirely to San Rocco Seno d’Elvio. Only a portion of this village falls within the boundaries of the Barbaresco DOCG zone, and its other Barbaresco-designated vineyards—“Rizzi,” “Montersino,” and “Meruzzano”—bleed into the village of Treiso. The contours of the Rocche Massalupo are varied, as it wraps itself around a hillside all the way from south (and even a little southeast) up to the northwest. The Lanos source grapes from parcels facing south-southwest, sharing space in the Rocche Massalupo with several neighbors, including legendary Pio Cesare, who also count it as a key site.
Gianluigi Lano has built his career on elegant, classic Barbaresco but when you’re also dealt with a legendary vintage—one that yielded zero heat spikes, providential pockets of rainfall, and minimal humidity—a wine of infinite depth, balance, and perfume emerges. While there are judicious aromas of sappy black cherry, roasted plum, and plush dark berries, it’s the surging non-fruit perfume that makes my head spin: sandalwood, Cuban tobacco, black tar, charred rose, lavender, and blood orange peel. Precise intensity and heft are ever-present on the palate, but the equilibrium is impeccable—bright acidity and polished, relatively mild tannins create truly impressive length on the finish. If drinking in the near term, please decant for no less than 30 minutes and serve at 60 degrees in large Burgundy stems. But, again, I must stress that Gianluigi Lano is a master of age-worthy Barbaresco, so I recommend buying six bottles and checking in on its jaw-dropping evolution every three years!
