Château Bellisle Mondotte

The estate

The Escure family story starts with Jean Baptiste Luquot and Marie Escure, who came down from Corrèze to the banks of the Dordogne at the end of the 19th century and bought a property at Fronsac in 1904. Their daughter Amélie married Frézal Escure in 1919; in 1924 Frézal bought Château Grand Pey Lescours at Saint-Sulpice-de-Faleyrens, and in 1953 he and Amélie added Bellisle Mondotte, on the slopes east of Saint-Émilion at Saint-Laurent-des-Combes. After Frézal died in 1957 their younger son Pierre ran the 2 properties; his wife Micheline succeeded him in 1989, and their daughter Françoise has directed them since 1999.

The vineyard is small, about 4.5 hectares, mostly Merlot, on clay and limestone: a soft rock the roots can work their way into, with clay beneath that keeps the vines supplied with water through the summer. Part of the family’s vineyards was certified organic by Ecocert in 2013 and all of them in 2014; Haute Valeur Environnementale (High Environmental Value, the French state’s environmental certification for farms) followed with the 2019 vintage. The grapes are picked by hand, plot by plot, over sorting tables, lightly crushed and fermented in temperature-controlled vats with pumping over several times a day, for about 3 weeks in all. The malolactic runs in barrel, and the wine ages 12 to 15 months in French oak, mostly from the forest of Tronçais.

At a glance

Appellation

Saint-Émilion Grand Cru

Commune

Saint-Laurent-des-Combes

Classification

No classification

Owner

SCEA Héritiers Escure; the Escure family since 1953

Direction

Françoise Escure, since 1999

Vineyard

About 4.5 hectares

Ground

Clay and limestone on the slopes; clay in the subsoil

Grapes

Mostly Merlot

Farming

Organic, Ecocert, in part from 2013 and wholly from 2014; Haute Valeur Environnementale from the 2019 vintage

Cellar

Picked by hand, plot by plot; about 3 weeks in vat; malolactic in barrel; 12 to 15 months in French oak

Wines

Château Bellisle Mondotte

The house

Also Château Grand Pey Lescours, Saint-Émilion Grand Cru, about 25 hectares at Saint-Sulpice-de-Faleyrens, in the family since 1924

Sources: Vignobles Escure · Vignobles Escure, Château Bellisle Mondotte · Vignobles Escure, the history · Vignobles Escure, the environmental footprint · Vignobles Escure, legal notice · Agence Bio, the national register of organic operators, SCEA Héritiers Escure