The Schönleber family traces their ancestry in the area of Monzingen back to the 18th century, but until the 1970s the domaine was a generally anonymous farm. Grapes were just one among several crops, and the real money was in the livestock. Over the course of three decades, Wilhelm and then his son Werner transformed the estate into a pure vineyard based around holdings in Burgundy-style holdings in three of the Nahe regions ‘grand cru’ vineyards, each of them south facing, unbearably steep and covered in slate soil: Auf der Lay, Frühlingsplätzchen, and Halenberg. With Werner at the helm by the 1990s, the wines started to garner attention in wine circles and the winery became one of the very best known Nahe producers alongside Dönnhoff and Schäfer-Fröhlich. Werner’s son Frank handles winemaking now, and the top-line wines evoke comparisons to Weingut Keller for their ability to reach both ethereal levels of aromatic complexity and earth’s-mantle levels of mineral depth. With German wine and its reputation both on the upward swing, Emrich-Schönleber is going to be one of the super famous names for a generation to come.