Amarone Bertani 2015 – James Suckling’s Wine of the Year 2024

Bertani Amarone della Valpolicella Classico 2015 – James Suckling’s Wine of the Year 2024

Hong Kong-based American wine critic James Suckling is a big deal in the Italian wine world. More than any other big international writer, Suckling takes Italy very seriously, always prioritising it and its produce at least equally with traditional oeno-press favourite France, not to mention a host of other wine regions that deserve more prestige than they are sometimes afforded. So when he releases his top hundred wines list each December, including his wine of the year, there is obvious anticipation in many quarters.

The list is nothing if not various. The last time an Italian wine got the top spot was in 2019, when the Siro Pacenti Brunello di Montalcino Vecchie Vigne 2015 was given the honour. Since then, first place has gone to wines as various as Champagne, New Zealand chardonnay, and Patagonian pinot noir – so, while Italy gets an appropriate amount of attention and emphasis, the net is cast wide and there’s by no means any guarantee that a bottle from the boot will find itself named top banana.

All of which leads us to the exciting news that Veneto’s very own Bertani, one of the great famiglie storiche of the Valpolicella region, a going concern since 1857 and quite possibly the innovators of dry winemaking in the region to begin with, has in fact scooped top spot in 2024 for its flagship Amarone della Valpolicella Classico wine from 2015.

Suckling’s ratings are interesting in part because he takes aspects such as affordability into consideration rather than simply going on immediate experience (which, as we know, is never as pure as we might like it to be, influenced as we are by the ambience, the showmanship the top wineries can afford to put on, the sense of wanting to be impressed by something, and so on), which is one reason you don’t find a lot of Château Margaux or Opus One atop his end-of-year listings. Which isn’t to say this is a budget list – simply that the gettability of the wine must be taken into account. An overpriced bottle invites suspicion, after all.

And it’s for this that Bertani, with their combination of competitive pricing, undeniable quality and, perhaps especially, undeniable expression of time and place, have caught the Suckling eye so notably this year. Here’s what he had to say about it:

“The wine world needs to give more recognition to classical wines that embody the greatness of time and place. This is one reason that JamesSuckling.com has chosen the Bertani Amarone della Valpolicella Classico 2015 as our Wine of the Year for 2024. It comes from vineyards on the Tenuta Novare estate in the northeastern Italian region of Valpolicella Classico, where vines have thrived since the Roman Empire. The wine’s balance and refinement are breathtaking, illustrating the greatness of neoclassical wines today – wines that draw from the past but reflect contemporary precision in viticulture and winemaking, offering the ultimate in harmony and drinkability. And its superb character and nature shines through in the glass despite the traditional grape-drying processes used to produce this red.”

We love that term, ‘neoclassical’. Bertani exemplify the way that traditional styles in much of the old world, from Douro to Georgia, have in fact come to feel cutting edge, modern in fact, in response to the heavily international style much in vogue of yesteryear. Bertani’s Amarone is an expression of Amarone della Valpolicella in and of itself, not trying to cater to any other palate around the world but simply trying to please on its own terms. Moreover, the fact that 2015 was such a phenomenal vintage is reflected in the brilliance of the wine redounds only to Bertani’s credit, as vintage variation (again, once thought a weakness) has come to be highly desired in the wine world, as this shows something ineffable, and unconfectible – the mysterious infinities by which a place, a terroir, a bunch of weather, can influence the wine that eventually goes into the glass.

Neoclassical – couldn’t have put it better ourselves. The Bertani Amarone della Valpolicella Classico 2015 nabbing James Suckling’s wine of the year rating is a big deal for the region, indeed for Italy, as well as for those in the wine world who want to make tradition modern again, to showcase to the world that the thing worth seeking out is surprise, particularity, uniqueness. We tip our hats – and raise our glasses.