Château Beauregard

The estate

The Knights of Saint John were at Beauregard in the 11th century, and the place turned from a mixed farm to vines in the middle of the 18th. The house, a Girondine chartreuse by a pupil of Victor Louis, went up in the Napoleonic era, and the Guggenheim family liked it well enough to build a copy of it, full size, as Mille-Fleurs at Port Washington, on Long Island, in 1932. One family held Beauregard through the whole 19th century record. Durand-Desgranges was the proprietor when Charles Cocks and Édouard Féret, whose Bordeaux et ses vins was the reference book of the Bordeaux trade, listed it in 1868 at 30 to 35 tonneaux (the old Bordeaux measure of a crop, 900 liters, or 4 barrels), among the bourgeois and first artisan growths of Pomerol; from 1874 they printed it a first growth of Pomerol, and in 1898 the same family made 45 tonneaux.

The Moulin and Cathiard families bought the estate in 2014, Philippe Houzé for the one and Florence and Daniel Cathiard for the other, and it has been certified organic since that year; Vincent Priou is general manager. The 17.5 hectares lie in more than 30 plots, mainly on gravel with clay, and on sand for the rest. The planting was Merlot and Cabernet Franc, 70 and 30, until 4% of Cabernet Sauvignon was added in 2016; every new planting goes in at 9,200 vines a hectare, and the vines are 35 years old on average. The wine ferments in 22 truncated-cone concrete vats filled by gravity and ages 15 to 20 months in barrels from up to 7 coopers. Benjamin de Beauregard, the second wine, comes from the sandier plots.

Pomerol has no classification, so the wine has to speak for itself. The 2018, which I tasted in June 2024, was deep ruby, almost purple, perfumed with oak and plums, with blackberries and earth on the palate, round tannins, high acidity and 14.5% of warm alcohol, and it kept improving in the glass; in September 2025 I wrote that it had the richness of the year without heaviness. The 2006, poured from a double magnum of 3 liters at lunch at the château during the en primeur tastings of 2026, was a classical, firm vintage in a format that rewards patience.

At a glance

Appellation

Pomerol

Classification

No classification

Owners

The Moulin and Cathiard families, since 2014

Direction

Vincent Priou, general manager

Vineyard

17.5 hectares in more than 30 plots; new plantings at 9,200 vines a hectare; vines 35 years old on average

Ground

Gravel with clay at the edge of the plateau; sand in the rest

Grapes

Merlot 70% and Cabernet Franc 30% until 2016, when 4% of Cabernet Sauvignon was added

Farming

Organic, certified since 2014

Cellar

22 concrete vats filled by gravity; 15 to 20 months in barrel

Wines

Château Beauregard; Benjamin de Beauregard

The house

A Girondine chartreuse of the Napoleonic era, copied on Long Island in 1932

In history

A first growth of Pomerol from 1874, in the same family from 1868 to 1898

Sources: Château Beauregard, the wine · Château Beauregard, history · Château Beauregard, the terroir · Château Beauregard, the people · Château Beauregard, vinification · Guto Assumpção on Instagram, Château Beauregard 2018, June 15, 2024 · Guto Assumpção on Instagram, Château Beauregard 2018, September 23, 2025 · Guto Assumpção on Instagram, Château Beauregard 2006, May 5, 2026