Le Pin 2015

A widow's hectare and a single pine

Le Pin is a red Bordeaux from Pomerol, on the Right Bank of the Gironde. The estate sits on the outskirts of the hamlet of Catusseau, in the middle of Pomerol's clay plateau, about a kilometer southwest of Vieux Chateau Certan. Its wine is frequently one of the most expensive red wines in the world, though it was not well known or especially expensive before 1985.

The land was owned from 1924 by a Madame Laubie, who sold the wine in bulk to Bordeaux merchants. By the account of Fiona Morrison, Jacques Thienpont's wife, Leon Thienpont of Vieux Chateau Certan spotted the opportunity in 1979: a recently widowed neighbor had a hectare of vines around a Basque-style house on stilts, with a small cellar beneath and a solitary pine tree behind it. The asking price was one million French francs, and the wider family judged it too expensive for Vieux Chateau Certan. Jacques, who had started working with his uncle Gerard in the family business in Etikhove, took it on, and 1979 was the first vintage under the Le Pin name.

The early winemaking was improvised. For his first vintages Jacques used a second-hand stainless steel vat and old barrels from Vieux Chateau Certan. With nowhere to put the new wine after fermentation, he ran it straight into barrels, and the second, malolactic fermentation happened there, by accident starting a practice that later spread through modern winemaking. Jacques designed the plain label himself on the counter of the local printer.

The Thienponts

The Thienponts are wine merchants from Etikhove in Belgium. Georges Thienpont, grandfather of Jacques, joined the family wine business in 1904, bought Chateau Troplong Mondot in Saint-Emilion in 1921 and Vieux Chateau Certan in Pomerol three years later, and was forced to sell Troplong Mondot in 1935, during the Depression. His grandsons now make wine at three separate estates: Jacques at Le Pin, Alexandre at Vieux Chateau Certan and Nicolas at Pavie Macquin.

Jacques expanded Le Pin a few vine rows at a time: 1.25 hectares to start, a 0.3-hectare plot in 1984 and a 0.7-hectare parcel of 70-year-old vines in 1985. Only parcels touching the original estate go into Le Pin. In 2011 a new winery designed by the Belgian architect Paul Robbrecht opened, with small conical stainless steel vats and gravity used to move the wine. The old farmhouse, and the pine tree, are gone.

Le Pin's rise owed something to timing. When it was first released, tastes were turning toward richer, riper Bordeaux. The French writer Jacques Luxey called it 'the Romanee-Conti of Bordeaux,' and Robert Parker then gave the 1982, Le Pin's fourth vintage, a perfect score. Since January 2022, Diana Garcia Berrouet has managed Le Pin in place of the retired Jacques, with Guillaume Thienpont, Alexandre's son, as winemaker.

2015: heat, then rain

Bordeaux went into 2015 needing a good year after four uneven ones, and growers talked about the 'rule of 5,' the idea that vintages ending in 5 tend to be good. Flowering began about May 25 under near-perfect conditions. Then came heat: a heat wave on June 29 brought temperatures of 41 degrees Celsius in the vineyards, and May, June and July were among the hottest and driest months on record in most appellations. By the end of July the vines had received almost 50% less rain than in most recent vintages.

August turned the other way, delivering almost twice its normal rainfall, with up to 100 mm in some vineyards. Soils that could handle drought and then drain the water produced small, thick-skinned berries. Many Pomerol growers began picking around September 17, in intermittent rain and humidity, and Petrus finished on September 29.

At Le Pin the crop was tiny. James Suckling, who visited in June 2016, counted the barrels himself: 20 of them. He later called it 'half a normal harvest.' The estate made three wines that year: an unnamed third wine from a parcel near Nenin, the second wine Trilogy from mostly old vines not judged good enough for the grand vin, and Le Pin itself. From 2015 on, according to one account, Le Pin has been fermented with a special commercial yeast because the site's very ripe, high-pH fruit could cause fermentations to stick.

Held back, then a perfect score

The family did not show the 2015 at the usual March barrel tastings. 'The wine was just not ready,' a Thienpont told Suckling. 'It wasn't showing right.' When it was finally tasted, Alexandre Thienpont, who oversees the vineyard, called it the densest and most structured Le Pin ever produced, and Suckling compared it to the 1982 and 1986. Neal Martin, scoring it 96-98 from barrel in the Wine Advocate, found a 'decidedly more structured Le Pin' at a modest 13.8% alcohol; Jacques Thienpont suggested it might resemble the 1986.

Suckling gave it 100 points twice, from barrel in June 2016 ('A new benchmark for Le Pin?') and from bottle in February 2018 ('Greatest ever, clearly. Wait until 2026.'). Lisa Perrotti-Brown gave it 99 in the Wine Advocate in February 2018, with a drinking window of 2022 to 2047, and 100 in The Wine Independent in November 2022, noting it was more closed and tighter than many 2015s. Wine Spectator and Jeb Dunnuck each scored it 97; Dunnuck found an 'elegant, almost Burgundian style' and judged it on a faster track than the 2016.

Not every taster agreed it was the greater year. Another taster, writing on an independent Bordeaux tasting site, rated it 94+ in October 2017 and preferred the 2016, finding the 2015 more red-fruited and 'barely as noble and kinky.'

Scarcity and price

Le Pin typically makes 600 to 700 cases a year by one reference and 400 to 600 by another, from a vineyard that rarely yields more than 30 hectoliters per hectare. Twenty barrels in 2015 put this vintage at the small end of an already small range.

In February 2026, a lot of three bottles of the 2015 sold for $9,375 in an online sale based in New York, against an estimate of $7,500 to $10,000. In October 2026 a US retailer listed the wine at $4,300.80 a bottle in six-bottle cases and $3,760.89 a bottle in three-bottle cases, as pre-arrival orders.

The numbers

Vineyard

About 2.7 ha (sources range from 2.0 to about 3 ha)

Typical production

About 600 to 700 cases a year (another source: 400 to 600)

2015 production

20 barrels, about half a normal harvest (James Suckling)

Alcohol

13.8% (Neal Martin, barrel sample)

James Suckling

100 (June 2016, barrel); 100 (February 2018)

The Wine Independent

100 (Lisa Perrotti-Brown, November 2022)

Wine Advocate

99 (Lisa Perrotti-Brown, February 2018); 96-98 (Neal Martin, June 2016, barrel)

Wine Spectator

97

Jeb Dunnuck

97

Timeline

1. 1904

   Georges Thienpont joins the family wine business in Etikhove, Belgium.

2. 1921

   Georges Thienpont buys Chateau Troplong Mondot in Saint-Emilion.

3. 1924

   Madame Laubie's ownership of the future Le Pin begins; she sells its wine in bulk. Georges Thienpont buys Vieux Chateau Certan around the same time.

4. Mar 1979

   The Thienponts buy the one-hectare vineyard; 1979 is the first vintage named Le Pin.

5. 1982

   Le Pin's fourth vintage wins the acclaim that makes its name.

6. 1984

   A 0.3-ha plot is added.

7. 1985

   Jacques Thienpont buys a 0.7-ha parcel of 70-year-old vines.

8. 2011

   A new gravity-fed winery designed by Paul Robbrecht opens.

9. May 25, 2015

   Flowering begins in Bordeaux under near-perfect conditions.

10. Jun 29, 2015

    A heat wave brings 41 degrees Celsius to Bordeaux vineyards.

11. Aug 2015

    Bordeaux receives almost twice its normal August rainfall.

12. Sep 17, 2015

    Many Pomerol estates begin picking.

13. Jun 22, 2016

    James Suckling tastes the 2015 from barrel at Le Pin and counts 20 barrels.

14. Feb 2018

    Suckling scores the bottled 2015 100 points; the Wine Advocate gives 99.

15. Jan 2022

    Diana Garcia Berrouet takes over management of Le Pin from the retiring Jacques Thienpont.

16. Nov 2022

    The Wine Independent scores the 2015 100 points.

17. Feb 12, 2026

    Three bottles of the 2015 sell for $9,375 in an online sale based in New York.

The world in 2015

• Jan 7, 2015

  Gunmen kill 12 people at the Paris offices of the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo.

• Apr 25, 2015

  A magnitude 7.8 earthquake strikes Nepal.

• Jul 14, 2015

  NASA's New Horizons makes the first flyby of Pluto.

• Jul 20, 2015

  Cuba and the United States restore full diplomatic relations.

• Sep 18, 2015

  Volkswagen is accused of rigging diesel emissions tests.

• Nov 13, 2015

  Coordinated terrorist attacks in Paris kill 130 people.

• Dec 12, 2015

  Nations agree a climate pact at the COP21 summit in Paris.

Price record

This is an asking price, not a sale. It is what a seller wanted on the date shown. Asking prices often sit above what buyers pay, but an ask is not a ceiling: a sale can land on either side of it. It is not a value.

By reference price, Le Pin 2015 is number 15 of 100 in the wine entries of the FLOAT 100. 12 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (12 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.

Did you know

• The 2015 was kept back from the March barrel tastings because the family felt it was not showing well yet.
• James Suckling counted the 2015's barrels himself in the Le Pin cellar: there were 20.
• Le Pin was bought in 1979 for one million French francs after the wider Thienpont family decided it was too expensive.
• Malolactic fermentation in barrel, later a fashion in Bordeaux, began at Le Pin because there was nowhere else to put the wine.
• Jacques Thienpont designed Le Pin's label himself on the counter of the local printer.
• From 2015 on, Le Pin has used a special commercial yeast to keep its very ripe musts from stalling during fermentation.
• The 2015 Bordeaux harvest followed one of the wettest Augusts on record, after one of the driest early summers.