"The more steps, the better the cellar!" "
- Burgundy saying.
Paul is the son of Burgundy winegrowers.
He discovered the Agly Valley during his training in 2009: it was the begining of a love story with the landscapes and the freedom of the wines. He comes back there regularly between two trips. During 5 years he worked for others and discovered the vineyards and the wine or the sommelerie in Japan, Chile, Portugal, Australia, Lebanon (countries he returned on the occasion of several vinifications) …
When the young winemaker decided that it was time to set up his own farm, to vinify at home, he choses the Agly Valley, in its upper part.
For its Natural Sweet Wines, for its viticultural richness (multiplicity of grape varieties, unique geological complexity with highly designed terroirs, ancient vineyards), for the great diversity of its wines, for the particular expression of each of its terroirs, the Fenouillèdes seemed to be a particularly attractive "home".
In 2013, Paul chose his first vines, sold by former cooperators. The plots are from 30 to over a hundred years old, on different terroirs from black schists, granit, clay-limestone alluviums at various altitudes (from 130 to more than 350 meters).
He works carignans, grenaches, syrahs, macabeus, lladoner pelut and a small plot of muscat during this first campaign, while looking for a place to vinify the coming harvest.
However, the need began urgent as the first harvest was fast approaching, and the old cooperative cellar of Centernach, in which Paul discovered the Fenouillèdes in 2009, is put on sale: it's obvious, here is the Place.
Lucile joined the estate from the first harvest in 2014 and quickly got implicated in all the works. From her experiences as an actress, she brings an artistic and cultural vision of wine, which results in the original communication of the domaine.
Lucile's other advantage is that she doesn’t come from the wine world so she gets a fresh look at wines and vines. It is undoubtedly this freshness that allows her to launch the production of dry Rancio in 2017 or to develop agroforestry on the estate.
Today Lucile and Paul are building the domain together: the alchemical equation is complete and time does its work.
In 2016 Perrine, Paul’s little sister, asked him to come and plow half of the inaccessible vineyard with a horse, and since then comes back every year to transform a technical question into beautiful animal resolution.
The vines are organically managed from the start, but it seems obvious.