Château Brown

The estate

The name is Scottish: John Lewis Brown, a wealthy wine merchant, bought the estate in 1795. Its shape came later. In 1893 Charles Cocks and Édouard Féret, whose Bordeaux et ses vins was the reference book of the Bordeaux trade, explain that the domain of Château-Brown-Léognan had been formed some 20 years earlier by joining the growths of the comtesse de Sers and of the lawyer Chassaing, on high rises of coarse gravel, and that it then had 50 hectares of vines. A book on the wines of the Graves published in 1908, Les vins des Graves rouges et blancs, ranks its wines among the first growths of Léognan and lists a gold medal at Amsterdam in 1884, the same award as Mouton, Léoville-Poyferré and Pontet-Canet, with more at Liège in 1905 and Bordeaux in 1907.

The modern revival began in 1994, when Bernard Barthe, a businessman from the cereals trade, bought Brown and set about restoring it, with Bruno Patrouilleau as technical director. In 2004 Jean-Christophe Mau, of the 5th generation of a family of Bordeaux merchants, bought it with the Dutch businessman Cees Dirkzwager, and Bruno Patrouilleau stayed on.

The property covers 60 hectares on the edge of the city, between Gradignan, Villenave-d’Ornon and Léognan, with 31 hectares of vines in a single stretch: 26 of red, 53% Cabernet Sauvignon, 45% Merlot and 2% Petit Verdot, and 5 of white, 60% Sauvignon Blanc and 40% Sémillon, planted at 7,400 vines a hectare. The ground is 2 rises of fine gravel mixed with alios: the highest plots are on deep gravel, the Merlot on clay-gravel, and the white grapes on the sandiest and most clayey soils. Brown makes about 10,000 cases of red and 2,000 of white a year.

At a glance

Appellation

Pessac-Léognan

Classification

No classification

Owners

Jean-Christophe Mau and Cees Dirkzwager, since 2004

Direction

Bruno Patrouilleau, technical director, since 1994

Vineyard

31 hectares of vines in a property of 60; 7,400 vines a hectare

Ground

2 rises of fine gravel and alios

Grapes

Red: Cabernet Sauvignon 53%, Merlot 45%, Petit Verdot 2%. White: Sauvignon Blanc 60%, Sémillon 40%

Production

About 10,000 cases of red and 2,000 of white

Not to be confused with

Château Cantenac Brown, 3rd growth, Margaux

In history

Among the first growths of Léognan in 1908; a gold medal at Amsterdam in 1884

Sources: Château Brown, the renaissance of the estate · Château Brown, an exceptional terroir · Pessac-Léognan, Château Brown