The Fun Bunch: Young Guns Lift China's Wine Game

Despite China’s economic slowdown, the wine industry is arguably in the middle of a renaissance of sorts thanks to an infusion of next-generation winemakers pooling their resources, expertise and vitality as they aim to expand their market beyond expensive, Bordeaux-inspired offerings toward a more tailored approach for ever-evolving consumer tastes in mainland China and abroad.

Young Generation China Wine (formerly known as “the Young Guns of China”) is one group that is redefining the country’s wine style and pushing its limits of winemaking. Spearheaded by Ian Dai, a former wine educator and the current winemaker behind the natural wine project Xiao Pu, YGCW was founded just two years ago but has already doubled in size to 19 members.

They include small, independent winemakers – some operating nomadically without their own wineries, like Xiao Pu – as well as other producers offering a wider range of wine-inspired beverages. They were sharing a stand last week at the Wine to Asia event in Shenzhen.

Among the members of YGCW is FARMentation, a project run by former Jade Valley (Shaanxi province) winemaker Luo Yuchen that produces outstanding wines and fruit-fermented drinks featuring table grapes, peaches, apricots and apples. Two other producer members, Xiao Pu and Gloriville, make satisfying natural and orange wines, while Ningxia-based Lingering Clouds concocts lovely pet-nats from riesling and chardonnays fermented with a variety of tea leaves.

“As a trained winemaker, I’ve always aspired to make fine wines, but over the last few years I have also realized the huge potential and the opportunities for wines and beverages that are more drinkable,” Luo said, referring to the success he has seen in not only making wines, such as his Farmentation Cabernet Sauvignon Shangri-La Nagu Cru 2020, but also fermented fruit drinks.

Dai said that while the group for now is “very relaxed and laid back” – if somewhat disorganized – it is gaining in steam as a platform for introducing new, small producers to a wider audience, both in China and abroad. “It is also an association where people can share information,” he added. “For now, the most important activity is that people can opt to attend wine trade fairs like Prowein and Wine to Asia and share the costs” of marketing and building their product base.

The only criterion for inclusion in the group at the moment seems to be that members be “small, independent and fun,” Dai said – if not somewhat avant-garde.

Other producer members of the group include Petit Mont of Ningxia, which makes excellent wines in a more traditional style while drawing inspiration from the high-elevation terroirs of Ningxia, Shangri-la, and Xinjiang as part of its “virtual winemaking” project – it produces wines in different regions using rented equipment and rented space.

Another Ningxia-based project, Devo, specializes in boutique, handmade sparkling wines, while September Helan, a traditional winery in Ningxia owned by the sister team of Gao Yu Jie and Gao Yu Rui, appears to be transitioning toward making approachable, fruit-fermented beverages.

But there are also more established wineries in China that belong to the group, like Ningxia’s Domaine Charme and Mountain Wave, who also both employ China’s most promising young winemaker, Deng Zhongxiang, as a consultant in their efforts to stay at the top of the market when it comes to unique, drinkable and terroir-transparent wines that appeal to a younger generation.

There are similar wine collectives in other countries, such as Australia’s Young Gun of Wine, which showcases rising Australian winemakers and nascent wine labels, and Chile’s Independent Winemakers Movement (Movi), but the growing attention YGCW receives at wine fairs like Wine to Asia and Prowein reflects the increasing market interest in China-made wines with their own unique identity. And such an alliance of young winemakers from the country also sends a positive signal to the Chinese market: one need not conform to the traditional image of a suited connoisseur to savor a glass of wine.

Below are tasting notes for the wines of some of the YGCW producers that we have previously rated. We taste around 400 wines every year from China, and there’s plenty more to come this year.

– Zekun Shuai, Senior Editor

Note: You can sort the wines below by vintage, score and alphabetically by winery name. You can also search for specific wines in the search bar.