The specificity of this cuvee is to be produced from the same syrah plot, “Collet du Château” planted in 1978 ; cabernet sauvignon only comes as a complement. This plot was cleared out and a lovely stone dike wase built, using du out stone blocks. Grey schists are mixed with chalky-clayey soils, so the rootstocks (140 Ru and R110) have been adapted according to the soil changes.

Winter and Spring 2015/2016 were soft and dry. The months of May and June were colder than usually. Flowering started on May 15th on the grenaches and both flowering and fruit set went well. The mistral, which has been very present since the beginning of the year, helped to ensure a very good sanitary state within the vineyard. July and August have been warm and dry. The harvest started on August 22th and finished on September 14th.

The vineyards are worked by hand, using natural animal fertilizers. We do not use any chemical weed killers. Buds are trimmed and a green harvest is practice to purposefully limit yields. A part of the vineyard is plowed with horses. The area between the rows of vines is grassed over with cereals.

The grapes are picked and sorted by hand, according to their polyphenolic ripeness (depending on the evolution of the maturity, two to three analytical tests and berry tastings are carried out every week in order to determine the optimum harvest date). In the press room, the berries are destemmed, slightly treaded and transferred into stainless steel vats. The alcoholic fermentation is run so as to extract optimum fruit and colour, but also to produce an legant wine. Maceration lasts about 10 days. Once the malolactic fermentation is over, the wines are stored into French oak casks for 18 months’ maturation. Two or three ransfers are performed during the maturation. Then the wine is blended in vats and bottledin the Château.