When Is a Wine Flaw No Longer a Flaw?

In wine culture, wine faults create fierce disagreements. Some people find volatile acidity thrilling. For others, a hint of it will cause them to pour the wine down the drain. A trace of Brettanomyces smells earthy and complex to one person, while someone else thinks the wine resembles a horse blanket left in a damp shed. Reduction causes those flinty notes we love in Chablis but can also smell like rotten eggs.

So who is right?

The usual debate tends to divide into two camps. Some winemakers, and tasters as well, treat any departure from technical cleanliness as damage. If they taste any level of volatile acidity, Brett, oxidation, or reduction the wine is judged to be inferior.

But “fault romance” makes the opposite mistake. It treats flaws as signs of authenticity, proof that the wine has escaped the dead hand of industrial winemaking. Funk is a  virtue. Volatility signals the wine has vitality. A murky bottle smells like a barnyard because, apparently, barns have terroir.

For me, neither position gets it right.

The important question is what the supposed fault does to the wine. Does it disrupt the wine’s structure and muddy its distinctions? Or does it contribute to the wine’s organization by creating tension, extending an aroma, sharpening a contrast, or generating a surprising new direction for that wine type?

Take volatile acidity for example. When excessive, it turns the fruit sour and thin. But a smaller amount of VA can lift the aroma and keep ripe fruit from becoming heavy. The volatility works because of its relation to the rest of the wine. It can’t be judged in isolation.

Brett works the same way. A strong medicinal or animal character can erase fruit and reduce complexity. Yet a faint earthy or leathery note can give depth to a mature wine, especially when it connects with savory flavors already present. It can give a wine a pleasing rustic aspect. It earns its place when it contributes to the whole.

The value of oxidation depends on the kind of wine under consideration. A young, fruit driven wine damaged by oxygen loses freshness and definition.  Yet controlled oxidative development creates many of the aromas we value in Sherry, Madeira, aged Champagne, and some mature white wines. In those cases oxidation is not an intrusion into the wine’s identity but part of the form that identity takes.

Reduction also occupies a continuum from contribution to clear fault. A smoky or flinty note can add tension and mystery, especially when it gradually opens in the glass. But when sulfur compounds smother the fruit that is clearly a fault.

So we should avoid rendering automatic verdicts when these alleged faults are present. Technical analysis can tell us what compounds are present and whether winemaking problems caused them. That information is important for winemakers who want assurances their wines are stable. But when we make  aesthetic judgments we are asking a different question: How does this feature shape the experience of the wine?

Cleanliness alone does not guarantee beauty, but funk alone does not guarantee character either. There is a category of interesting wines that occupy a border between beauty and mere oddity, where an unruly element changes what the wine can express.

That border is aesthetically interesting but it’s important to know when a wine has crossed it. A wine has crossed that border when the unruly element no longer creates contrast or development but becomes the first and last thing we notice.