Dr. Loosen Wehlener Sonnenuhr GG Riesling Dry

Dr. Loosen is a wine producer based just outside Bernkastel in the Mosel region, easily one of Germany's most famous Riesling producers, and has won numerous awards for numerous wines from the portfolio. The estate owns six major vineyards, all of which were designated as Erste Lage in the 1868 Prussian Classification of Mosel vineyards.

Zach. Bergweiler-Prüm Erben is Mosel winemaker Ernst Loosen’s exploration of the historical winemaking traditions of his family. This singular project pays tribute to Ernst’s maternal great-grandfather, who was a major Mosel wine producer at the turn of the 20th century. Born in 1861, Zacharias Bergweiler built a substantial wine estate in the village of Wehlen. The wines are grown and produced according to the extremely patient and low-intervention practices used in the time of Zacharias, when German Rieslings enjoyed their greatest reputation around the world. Loosen took this legacy as an opportunity to carry his ancestors' style into the present. The plot is cultivated without chemicals and exclusively by hand.

T he GG is a selection of fully ripe, healthy fruit harvested from a parcel of 130-year-old, ungrafted vines that was handed down by Zacharias. After a brief maceration on the skins, the grapes were gently pressed in a restored basket press from 1910, then fermented and matured for 24 months in a traditional 1,000-liter Fuder cask.

This Riesling opens with deep, discreet, restrained and spicy rather than tropical fruit on the nose that is rather coolish and leafy/herbal given the warm and dry vintage and, in any case, seriously complex, with delicate slate notes. Full-bodied, round and finely juicy on the palate, this is an elegant, refined and complex, substantial and intense. 

Total production: 1200 bottles