Château La Croizille

The estate

La Croizille is a single amphitheater sculpted in the rock on the slopes of the clay and limestone plateau, between Château Tertre Rotebœuf and Château Troplong Mondot, looking down over Saint-Laurent-des-Combes from 30 to 70 meters up; the curve of the ground gives it several soils and several exposures inside 4.45 hectares. For most of its history it was nobody’s idea of a famous growth. Charles Cocks and Édouard Féret, whose Bordeaux et ses vins was the reference book of the Bordeaux trade, knew it only as a small holding of the commune: Laforest at 12 tonneaux (the old Bordeaux measure of a crop, 900 liters, or 4 barrels) in 1883, then Larquey, of Castillon, at 15 and later 20 tonneaux from 1897 to 1922, never with a line of description.

The turn came in 1996, when Jacques De Schepper, a Belgian wine merchant who already owned Château Tour Baladoz next door and Château Haut Breton Larigaudière in Margaux, bought it. The vineyard was restructured; in 2012 he and his nephew Olivier finished a new cellar, half buried and dug into the limestone; and from 2015 his daughter Hélène opened the estate to visitors. In September 2022 La Croizille became a Grand Cru Classé for the first time, in the same list as Tour Baladoz: 2 estates of 1 family, classified together.

The 4.45 hectares lie in 1 piece, planted 80% Merlot and 20% Cabernet Sauvignon. The grapes are sorted 2 times, by hand and by optical sorter, and reach small temperature-controlled vats by gravity; the wine spends 18 to 24 months in French oak, each barrel turned on its own rack. Les Terrasses de La Croizille is the second wine.

At a glance

Appellation

Saint-Émilion Grand Cru

Commune

At Baladoz, on the slopes above Saint-Laurent-des-Combes

Classification

Grand Cru Classé in 2022, the first time

Owners

The De Schepper family, since 1996

Vineyard

4.45 hectares in 1 piece, a natural amphitheater cut into the rock, 30 to 70 meters up

Ground

Clay and limestone on the slopes of the plateau

Grapes

Merlot 80%, Cabernet Sauvignon 20%

Farming

Haute Valeur Environnementale (High Environmental Value, the French state’s environmental certification for farms), level 3, since 2017; ISO 14001

Cellar

Sorted 2 times, by hand and by optical sorter; gravity; small vats; 18 to 24 months in French oak

Wines

Château La Croizille; Les Terrasses de La Croizille

Sources: Château La Croizille, the vineyard · Château La Croizille, the expertise · Château La Croizille, the wines · Association des Grands Crus Classés de Saint-Émilion, Château La Croizille · Institut National de l’Origine et de la Qualité, the Saint-Émilion classification of 2022