Michelin Has Reclassified Bordeaux

Michelin Has Reclassified Bordeaux.

Montrose and Lafleur have three Michelin Grapes. Mouton Rothschild has two. Le Pin has one. Latour has none.

Michelin's move into wine is very new. The Guide launched its first Grape selection in Burgundy just two months ago, before following with Bordeaux yesterday. Michelin seems not to be experimenting with one famous region, but building a new wine classification system that could potentially stretch far beyond France.

This classification ranks estates and producers, not individual wines or vintages. It comes in Michelin's usual ranking of one, two or three Grapes rather than Stars. The assessment includes the wine's quality, terroir, viticulture and consistency.

What makes this new classification so much fun is its scrambling of the Bordeaux hierarchy. This is a region where wines have historically been defined by classifications created decades or even centuries ago. Michelin is arriving with a new question, not what a chateau was, but what it is today.

Petrus, Lafite Rothschild, Cheval Blanc, Figeac, Lafleur and La Conseillante all received the top Three Grape rating. So too did Montrose and Leoville Las Cases, both Second Growths under the 1855 Classification. Meanwhile, Mouton Rothschild, Margaux and Haut-Brion received just Two Grapes, while Le Pin and Smith Haut Lafitte were awarded just One.

That immediately puts the cat among the pigeons. Michelin is placing Montrose above Mouton, La Conseillante above Le Pin, and a number of historically lower-ranked estates alongside the most famous names in Bordeaux.

Michelin hasn't rewritten the 1855 Classification. This system measures something else, based on the producer as Michelin sees it today rather than on historic standing. Having said this, Bordeaux is a region where classification carries enormous commercial and cultural weight, so those distinctions are difficult to ignore.

For Bordeaux, that may be the real significance of the new system. Michelin has introduced a hierarchy that is simple, globally recognisable and apparently willing to contradict the old one.

I have thought for a long time that Bordeaux needs to modernise. La Place de Bordeaux is archaic, prices are unaffordable for most, and you can forget about wine tourism for the most part higher up these lists. This new system could hopefully be the start of a new age for Bordeaux: embracing the future rather than obsessing over the past.

Bordeaux is hardly short of its classifications. There is the 1855 Classification, the Saint-Emilion system, critics' scores, auction prices and negociant demand. Michelin is entering a very crowded field.

Its advantage is in simplicity and reputation. Most consumers will never memorise the 1855 Growths but they already understand what Michelin means. Three Grapes can communicate something that requires no prior wine knowledge.

That makes the system very useful in restaurants, retail and direct-to-consumer sales, where a recognisable symbol will have more impact than an hour long lesson on archaic French legislation.

Having said that, the system is new, its methodology is still being questioned, and there is no evidence yet that a Grape rating will materially move demand. Bordeaux has seen plenty of critics rise and fall while it has stood the test of time.

For now, the classification is more interesting as a challenge to the existing order than as a replacement for it.

See the full list below.

THREE MICHELIN GRAPES

TWO MICHELIN GRAPES

ONE MICHELIN GRAPE

MICHELIN SELECTED