Quinta do Noval has officially declared its 2024 Vintage Ports, with Managing Director Christian Seely confirming the release of Quinta do Noval Nacional Vintage Port 2024, Quinta do Noval Vintage Port 2024, and Quinta do Passadouro Vintage Port 2024, calling all three “exceptional”.
According to Seely, the 2024 growing cycle was characterised by unusually favourable conditions.
“A rainy winter and a spring with good water availability replenished the water reserves in the soil and encouraged an early budburst in March,” he explained.
Summer started cool, which slowed down the ripening of the grapes and helped them develop evenly. August brought dry weather, and while younger vines showed some water stress, older vines remained in perfect balance, because they are rooted in deep and water‑retaining soils. September continued with mild conditions and cool nights, preserving freshness, aromatic purity and acidity.
“The grapes, harvested in perfect conditions, arrived at the lagares ripe, healthy and beautifully balanced, with pure fruit, freshness and good phenolic ripeness,” Seely added.
Christian Seely is Managing Director of AXA Millesimes, the wine property arm of French insurance giant AXA Assurances, one of the most important fine wine groups in the world. Seely oversees all the group’s properties including Quinta do Noval, Chateau Pichon Baron, Chateau Suduiraut, Chateau Pibran, Domaine de l’Arlot Nuits, Disznoko, Platt Vineyard and Outpost.
Several plots of Touriga Nacional, Touriga Francesa, and Sousão performed particularly well.
However, Seely singled out the legendary Nacional vineyard, a tiny, ungrafted parcel planted on its own rootstock, alongside several old mixed variety vineyard parcels as proving “exceptional”.
The resulting wines, he says, show “great purity of fruit, structure and aromatic depth. They are precise, refined and very well balanced, with a remarkable combination of elegance and intensity.”
Of the 143 hectares of vineyard, two have never been affected by phylloxera. Why that is so, no one really knows. Seely may not be a technical person, but he has tried to unravel the mystery by replanting cuttings from the plot to other parts of the remaining 141 hectares of vines. It hasn’t worked, though. Like a poet who knows better than to challenge the divine, the secret remains. It is no accident that the name of this single two‑hectare parcel reflects all that is dearest and most precious to vinous Portugal. NACIONAL.
The Nacional is a unique and extraordinary phenomenon. It does not necessarily follow the same rhythm as the rest of Quinta do Noval. In some years, a great Nacional is produced when Noval does not even declare the Quinta do Noval Vintage. In others, Quinta do Noval makes a great Vintage Port, and the Nacional does not perform.
Quinta do Noval has a 2-hectare plot unaffected by phylloxera. The miracle is named NACIONAL.
While many Vintage Ports require decades of cellaring to reveal their true nature, the 2024 declarations are already highly expressive in their youth. Nonetheless, Seely emphasised that they possess the structure, depth and balance required for a long and promising evolution in bottle.
For collectors and enthusiasts, the 2024 trio represents a rare opportunity: three distinct expressions of a single great vintage from one of the Douro’s most historic estates.
