Château Gressier Grand Poujeaux

The estate

Gressier Grand Poujeaux takes its name from a Mr Gressier and from the hamlet of Grand Poujeaux, on the gravel rise where Chasse-Spleen also stands. In 1820 an undivided inheritance split the property: the brother kept Gressier Grand Poujeaux, and the sister’s share became Chasse-Spleen. The family’s wine was known early. William Franck, whose Traité sur les vins du Médoc first appeared in 1824, lists the widow Gressier first among the growers of Moulis in that year, and André Jullien, the Paris wine merchant whose Topographie de tous les vignobles connus of 1816 surveyed the vineyards of the world, names the wines of the château and of M. Gressier as the ones preferred at Poujeaux in his edition of 1832.

Phylloxera, wars and crises tried the successive Gressiers, who along the way became Saint-Affriques. Charles Cocks and Édouard Féret, whose Bordeaux et ses vins was the reference book of the Bordeaux trade, first print the name Gressier-Grand-Poujeaux in 1868, under the baron de Saint-Affrique; in 1874 it heads the crus bourgeois supérieurs of Moulis, at 70 tonneaux (the old Bordeaux measure of a crop, 900 liters, or 4 barrels), under Mmes Gressier and de Saint-Affrique, and in 1922 it stands under B. de Saint-Affrique. It was among the crus bourgeois of the classification of 1932. In the 1960s, when the INAO tried to revise the classification of 1855, Gressier Grand Poujeaux and Chasse-Spleen dreamed for a while of becoming third growths; the project was soon forgotten. The same family held the estate until 2003, when it sold to its neighbor Chasse-Spleen, and the 2 shares of 1820 came back under 1 owner.

The Merlaut family, through Céline Villars, Jacques Merlaut’s granddaughter, and her husband Jean-Pierre Foubet, kept the name and the traditional blend of 50% Cabernet Sauvignon and 50% Merlot. The 10 hectares lie on gravel over limestone with fossil starfish and on clay over the limestone of Listrac, with vines 35 years old on average, and hold Haute Valeur Environnementale (High Environmental Value, the French state’s environmental certification for farms) at level 3. The wine is made in temperature-controlled stainless steel and cement vats and spends 12 months entirely in wood, 20% of it new.

At a glance

Appellation

Moulis

Commune

Moulis-en-Médoc

Classification

No classification

Owner

Château Chasse-Spleen, the Merlaut family, since 2003

Direction

Céline Villars and Jean-Pierre Foubet

Vineyard

10 hectares; vines 35 years old on average

Ground

Gravel over limestone with fossil starfish; clay on the limestone of Listrac

Grapes

Cabernet Sauvignon 50%, Merlot 50%

Farming

Haute Valeur Environnementale, level 3

Cellar

Stainless steel and cement vats; 12 months entirely in wood, 20% new

The house

Also Château Chasse-Spleen, Moulis

In history

The widow Gressier first in Moulis in 1824; first of the crus bourgeois supérieurs of Moulis in 1874; a cru bourgeois in 1932

Sources: Château Chasse-Spleen, Château Gressier Grand Poujeaux · Château Chasse-Spleen, the other wines · Moulis-en-Médoc, Gressier Grand Poujeaux · Moulis-en-Médoc, Chasse-Spleen and Brillette