LWF pays tribute to Spurrier with ‘Judgement of London’

The London Wine Fair is to pay homage to the late Steven Spurrier and the landmark ‘Judgment of Paris’ competition with its own version.

Dubbed the ‘Judgement of London’, it will see a ‘significantly updated’ version of the infamous 1976 blind tasting, which saw Californians beat French wines, and ‘reflect the breadth and maturity of today’s fine wine market’.

Rather than pitching Bordeaux and Burgundies against Californian counterparts, this new version, which will take place on the first day of the LWF on 20 May, will see a ‘broader inclusion’ of European wines and Rest of the World equivalents.

It aims to provide ‘a more realistic benchmarking’ of the fine wine world, a quarter of a century after the sector was shaken to its core by the Spurrier-led event in Paris.

It will be curated by Ronan Dayburn MS, CEO of The Court of Master Sommeliers, alongside Sarah Abbott MW, MD of Swirl Wine Group.

The tasting panel will comprise around 20 judges of the UK industry’s leading buyers, top sommeliers and wine writers, in exam conditions at a private room at Kensington Olympia.

It will see wines tasted in pairs with a European taking on a Rest of the World, matched by grape variety, style and texture, with selected producers submitting a vintage within a five to 15 year old window.

Eight white pairs will be tasted in the morning and a further eight reds in the afternoon. Condition will be checked by Abbott and Sayburn prior to tasting with logistics provided by Sensible Wine Services.

The wines will be scored out of 10, with half marks allowed. With 20 judges, each wine will then have a final score out of 200.

The scoring system allows for eight key findings, all of which will be revealed on the centre stage the following day (21 May) at 4.45pm. Judgement of London is supported by the Academie du Vin Library, the publishing house established by Spurrier in 2019, who have provided a copy of Spurrier’s memoirs for each of the tasting panel.

Jancis Robinson OBE MW, who will be one of the judges, said: “(It is) a fitting tribute to the late Steven Spurrier, whose London flat was so close to Olympia where we will be tasting a range of  the world’s finest wines blind in order to celebrate what progress has been made since his 1976 Judgment of Paris.”  

Head of London Wine Fair, Hannah Tovey said: “The tasting is set to be a celebration of the very best of wine; an appreciation of just how great fine wine can be, and we are thrilled to platform such a compelling event at the London Wine Fair.”  

Sarah Abbott MW, said she was “honoured and excited” to work on the tasting.

She said: “The world of wine is rightly moving on from “old-world vs new-world”, but Stephen Spurrier’s lesson – that great wine is of the whole world – is as important and timely now as it was when that iconoclastic tasting was held nearly 50 years ago.”

Ronan Sayburn MS, said the original Judgement of Paris tasting was a @classic underdog triumphs over the establishment” and opened the door to recognition of the emerging Californian wine industry.

He said: “In the ‘Judgement of London’ we won’t be looking for a clear winner as such, more celebrating how far wine from the world over has come in quality and recognition since 1976.”