What makes vintage wines

Mind you, only a very small proportion of all wines will improve with age: most white wines should be drunk within two-three years and the reds at best within three-five years

There’s a lot of confusion about “vintage wine” and wine ageing, so let me try to clarify:

The “vintage” of a wine is the year when the grapes used to make that wine were harvested (not the year when it was actually bottled). So wines made from grapes harvested in the northern hemisphere in September-October this year would be of the 2018 vintage, as would the wines made from grapes harvested in January-March in the Southern hemisphere.

The colloquial understanding of a “vintage wine” is one that is an old (and presumably good quality) wine. Mind you, only a very