A bright red color with orange highlights, the 2020 Brunello Di Montalcino is very pretty, with a delicate rustic hint that I find quite attractive. It reveals attractive red fruit on the nose, with notes of cranberries, wild herbs, and just a subtle hint of saddle leather and blood orange. Mid-weight, it's light on its feet while delivering wonderful energy and freshness, with snappy ripe red fruit, a refreshing, angular feel, and mouthwatering saline and acidity. This is certainly one of the highlights of the 2020 vintage. Drink 2025-2040.

Rich and exuberant in the glass, the 2020 Brunello di Montalcino bursts with autumnal spices, crushed raspberries, shaved cedar and dusty rose. It impresses further with a core of ripe red berry fruits that saturate deeply, displaying a pleasant inner sweetness offset by a salty core of minerality. The 2020 leaves the palate drenched in primary concentration with a tart cranberry, licorice resonance and grippy tannins, all while maintaining a remarkably fresh persona. The 2020 has a large-scale feel with expertly maintained balance.

Fuligni is among those properties which deem 2020 an ideal vintage for a long-lived Riserva. I can’t wait to try it next year. In the meantime, it will be impossible to resist this annata bottling. Harvest started on 20 September, straddling the rainfall which came late in the month. Seductive and sensual, this beauty exudes pressed dark flowers and all-encompassing Asian five-spice. Chestnut and bitter roots inject a countering element to the sweet, glossy fruit that expands across the palate. Long, chalky tannins wrap around the red cherry core, building with density, and steely acidity cleanses the mouth.