Coming from yields of 24 hectoliters per hectare, the 2020 Château Le Pin is all Merlot brought up in 75% new French oak, and it's the first vintage where the wine wasn't aged in all new barrels. An incredible wine, I think it surpasses the 2019, offering a classy bouquet of ripe black cherries, currants, tobacco, damp earth, and truffle, with perfectly integrated background oak that is certainly less noticeable than in previous vintages. Pure class on the palate, it’s full-bodied, deep, and concentrated, with perfect tannins, a layered, seamless mouthfeel, and a great finish. Still tight and reserved, it needs a solid decade of bottle age but is going to evolve for 30 years or more. It's a brilliant bottle of wine.

Ripe, dark chocolate, floral scents, rich blackcurrants - heady but refined. Supple and racy on the palate, thrilling even, a livewire of a wine. A combination of bitter and sour, savouriness and acidity. Much more freshness than I was expecting with clarity and precision. Lean and sinewy but with a wide finish. Less sexy more suave and it knows it! Quality of the tannins is excellent and this caresses the palate comfortably. A seamless and glowing Le Pin.

The aromatics take a few beats to arrive, and then show pure, bright blue and red berry fruits with incredible density and a pure velvet texture. This is a brilliant Le Pin - seductive, with the density and pleasure you expect from this estate, with slow delivery of pure black berry fruits and a toasted coffee and cocoa bean finish with cooler waves of gunsmoke and earth. A wine that you will take your time over, and that will give the best of itself with at least a decade in bottle. Keeps opening and deepening the longer that it stays in the glass. A yield of 24hl/ha (usually no higher than 34hl/ha so this is not so unusual). Sandy/gravel over clay soils. Harvest 14, 16 and 21 September. Malolactic fermentation in barrel.

Drinking Window 2028 - 2044

Jane Anson, Decanter.com, May 2021

The 2020 Le Pin, tasted with Jacques Thienpont in Pomerol, is limpid in the glass. It has an impressively pixelated nose with layers of dark plum, raspberry, slate and subtle potpourri scents. Unlike some recent vintages, this politely asks you to be patient and then unfurls at its own stately pace. The palate is medium-bodied with supple tannins and a fine bead of acidity. This does not set out to be a powerful Le Pin, but it gently builds to deliver a very precise, quite spicy finish that has very long persistence. Superb salinity on the aftertaste, not a million miles away from Lafleur despite the differences in composition (“Don’t ask me why…” commented Jacques Thienpont when I enquired about that aspect.) Give this 4-6 years in bottle and watch it blossom over many.
vinous.com

This estate occupies a well-draining, early-ripening site, and the 2020 Le Pin is certainly marked by the warmth and sunshine of the vintage, offering up a rich bouquet of jammy plums, kirsch, figs and licorice framed by a generous application of creamy new oak. Full-bodied, broad and expansive, it's rich and gourmand, with a layered mid-palate framed by plenty of powdery structuring tannin. While it can't match the purity and precision of the 2019, it's a strong effort.

100% Merlot. Cask sample. Typically seductive with a density of fruit and opulent form and texture. Aromatically alluring with zesty red fruit and floral notes and a hint of chocolate from the oak. Tannins very suave and dense. Point of salinity to give balance but the alcohol does show. (JL)

The 2020 Le Pin is magnificent. What a wine. Seamless and exotic, the 2020 races across the palate with sumptuous dark fruit and a whole range of rose petal, spice and hard candy overtones that build into the explosive mid-palate and finish. I especially admire how the 2020 opens with some aeration. New oak is down from 100% to 70%, which really allows the purity of the fruit to shine through. Yields were 30 hectoliters per hectare, down from the more typical 35 or so, but overall production for Le Pin in bottles is much lower, as about only half of the vineyards were used. The rest went into the second wine, with the exception of a small parcel that is being redeveloped. In short: What more can I ask from a wine? Nothing.