A Quarter of a Century in Chile: A Vertical Tasting of Seña

BY JOAQUÍN HIDALGO | AUGUST 3, 2022

What were you doing 25 years ago? A quarter of a century is a good chunk of anyone’s life, but time is always a matter of perspective. Whereas for some old-world producers 25 years can go by in the blink of an eye, in South America it represents an eternity. It’s hard to organize a vertical tasting that can adequately tell that story.

But it is not impossible. In Europe, a vertical tasting that spans 25 years might tell the tale of a slowly evolving tradition, but down south it’s more likely to be an account of breakthroughs and landmarks. And that’s what makes it so fascinating.

This summer, while I was compiling my Chile report, I had the opportunity to travel a quarter of a century into the past through a pair of iconic Chilean wines. Interestingly, both were created by the same man: Eduardo Chadwick. I say interestingly because people generally dedicate their lives to one overarching project; Chadwick has two. The vertical of Viñedo Chadwick will be featured in the coming weeks.

The barrel and foudre chamber in which Seña is aged in the heart of the winery Chadwick built for his wines in Panquehue, which neighbors Viña Errázuriz.

A Nod to History 

Let’s start with Seña and slip into the back seat of a car travelling the roads of Chile in 1991. At the wheel is a young Eduardo Chadwick and next to him in the passenger seat is the veteran Robert Mondavi. As circumstance would have it, the Chadwick finds himself taking Mondavi on a tour of the vineyards of Aconcagua, Maipo and Colchagua, to offer an idea of the country’s potential. Or perhaps it had nothing to do with circumstance at all but is rather one of a series of moves calculated to implement a vision of how Chilean wine should be. That would make this trip the culmination of a plan. Either way, Chadwick and Mondavi are getting on well, enjoying the conversation and landscape, and as they move from vineyard to vineyard, they begin to plot an ambitious project: the creation of an iconic Chilean wine. It’s a watershed moment.  

During those years, Mondavi was beginning to see the fruit of his work with Opus One – a joint venture with the Rothschild family – and the dream of making iconic wines in the Americas was really becoming a reality. In the case of Seña, Chadwick was already a partner with substantial pedigree: the heir to Viña Errázuriz, whose family tree features several presidents and titans of business. Chadwick had his feet on the ground but his eyes firmly fixed on the horizon. And so Seña was born; a wine made for the first time in 1995 whose name means “sign” or “brand”. Or landmark.  

To achieve this, Tim Mondavi went to Chile to take the reins of an Errázuriz team that also included another Californian émigré: the young Ed Flaherty, who oversaw oenology. This first Seña offers a good idea of what was to come: grapes chosen from the Errázuriz vineyards, a base of Cabernet Sauvignon and just under a third of Carménère. Both varieties would be present in all the following blends, in different proportions.

The Oenologist Francisco Baettig examining a soil sample from the Seña Vineyard. The angular rocks indicate a colluvial layer. 

In 1998, Mondavi and Chadwick invested in a 42-hectare vineyard, named Ocoa in the Aconcagua Valley, a narrow northeast-facing valley between the Andes and the Chilean Coastal Range. Ocoa is influenced by both mountain climate systems, an ample thermal range from the former and a cool, dry breeze from the latter. Its soils are a mixture of alluvial and colluvial make-ups as well as deposits of volcanic ash. Across these different seams, they planted Cabernet Sauvignon, Carménère, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot, while Malbec would follow a decade later. These varieties make up the core of Seña.

And so, the Mondavi-Chadwick partnership set out apace, and the wine began its journey. But as is true of all stories, there were twists to come. At the turn of the century, Mondavi was acquired by Constellation. Chadwick decided to keep going on his own and purchased the Mondavi stake. Chadwick was so proud of his work and product that in January 2004 he hosted the Judgment of Berlin: a blind tasting of famous wines from the old world  – 2000 Château Lafite-Rothschild, 2001 Château Margaux, 2000 Château Latour and 2000 Solaia  – alongside 2001 Seña and 2000 Viñedo Chadwick, his other flagship wine. The results saw both come out on top; in second and first place respectively.

Seña 1995-2020

With that background, and under the technical direction of Francisco Baettig since 2005, in 2020 Seña turned twenty-five. Including the forthcoming 2020, these 26 vintages take us on a journey through the different climatic conditions experienced each season – let it never be claimed again that conditions in Chile don’t change – as well as the various styles and approaches sought each year, influenced by prevailing trends in the wine industry at the time. We can divide the vintages into three main periods.

The Mondavi years run up to the new millennium. At this early stage, Seña was trying to strike a balance between Californian and Chilean approaches. For instance, the blend evolved over the years: it began as a Cabernet-Carménère before being joined by other varieties.  The style of the 1995, 1996 and 1997 vintages was fairly similar and 1,650, 2,000 and 2,100 cases were produced of each. Nineteen nighty-eight, however, was a difficult year and spurred a rethink, inspired by the winery’s own,now vineyard.   

Then came the years in which Chadwick explored the outer reaches of maturity with ripe, deep versions of his flagship wine in the 2000s. At the time, this ripe character was much sought after, and Seña was no exception.

Some of Seña's most interesting vintages: 1996, 2001, 2011, 2013, 2016, 2018 and 2019. The tasting took place on one of the vineyard's terraces.

We might call 2005 onward the Baettig years. These aren’t just the vagaries of fate but rather the result of decision-making and the development of the vineyard. I think we might also add another era following 2014: that of clarity, a process of fine-tuning that culminated in 2018 and 2019 with the triumph of style and interpretation, helped greatly by two excellent growing seasons. Where 2012, a warm year, represented the peak of the overripe, oaky approach, 2020 is a reflection of accumulated experience and a focus on balance achieved in similarly warm conditions. Seña produced 8,300 cases of the 2020 vintage.

The Ocoa vineyard is now mature, and the technical team is thoroughly familiar with each of its parcels: where the soils are deeper, they are able to stretch out the ripening of the Carménère, enhance the concentration of the Cabernet Sauvignon and limit irrigation. Since 2005, they have been working biodynamically with the assistance of Alan York and that is clear in the plants, whose lack of stress and nutritional health is evident. The yields are generally low for Chile, between six and eight tons per hectare, and they are harvested by hand. When I visited, on March 10 this year, harvesting hadn’t yet begun. 

Whatever vintage you choose, Seña will always represent the modernity of Chilean wine and show what can be done with a mixture of varieties from Aconcagua, with some years offering more nuance than others. Like all well-balanced, middle-aged vineyards, Seña continues to grow and will surely have more to provide in years to come. At the end of the day, however, as the proverb goes, it’s the journey that counts, as well as the lessons learned over twenty-five years of winemaking.

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