Château La Pointe

The château

La Pointe takes its name from the large pointed triangle of vines at the entrance to the estate, on the road from Libourne into Pomerol, next to Château Nénin and on the slope that falls from the terrace of Trotanoy. The house is Directoire, the plain French style of the late 1790s, and the 2 hectares of park around it, full of old trees, are left to the wildlife. Its wines rose early. In 1868 Charles Cocks and Édouard Féret, whose Bordeaux et ses vins was the reference book of the Bordeaux trade, printed a drawing of Château Lapointe with a note beside it: 23 hectares, 15 of them vines on sandy gravel over clay, and wines once reckoned second growths that had been selling as firsts for nearly 10 years, at 1,400 francs the tonneau (the old Bordeaux measure of a crop, 900 liters, or 4 barrels) for 1858 and 1,500 for 1865. M. Grandet held it then, and his daughter Octavie Grandet after him. By 1893 it had 26 hectares, 20 in vines, made 35 to 70 tonneaux, and had won a silver medal at Bordeaux in 1882 and another at Amsterdam in 1883, the only 2 exhibitions the wine had entered. Charles Montouroy bought it in July 1907 and kept to the ways of his predecessors.

The estate changed hands again in 2007, and the new work started underground: the geologist Pierre Becheler mapped the soils, the drainage was redone in 2008, and every plot has had a program of its own since 2009. Eric Monneret, an agricultural engineer, is general manager, and Pierre Candelier technical director. The vineyard is 23 hectares in one block, on 3 kinds of soil: gravel and pebbles on the terrace of the Isle, clay with gravel, and sand over clay or gravel. It holds Haute Valeur Environnementale (High Environmental Value, the French state’s environmental certification for farms) and ISO 14001 through the collective scheme of the Bordeaux wine trade, has never used a glyphosate weedkiller, puts sheep or green manure between the rows, collects rainwater and carries solar panels on the vat room. The plots are fermented apart in small vats. In April 2017 frost took more than 80% of the crop, and no first wine was made that year. Ballade de La Pointe is the second wine.

Old La Pointe can surprise. I served the 1989 blind at a tasting in October 2024, after opening it 2 hours ahead and decanting it for 45 minutes, and the guests took it for a wine of the 2000s: vibrant and layered, with dark plums, prunes, figs, smoke, spices and tobacco, the ripe power of the vintage carried by the structure of Pomerol.

At a glance

Appellation

Pomerol

Commune

Pomerol, on the road from Libourne, next to Château Nénin

Classification

No classification

Direction

Eric Monneret, general manager; Pierre Candelier, technical director

Vineyard

23 hectares in one block

Soil

Gravel and pebbles on the terrace of the Isle; clay with gravel; sand over clay or gravel Terroir of Pomerol →

Farming

Haute Valeur Environnementale; ISO 14001; no glyphosate; sheep and green manure

Cellar

Plot by plot in small vats

Wines

Château La Pointe; Ballade de La Pointe

The park

2 hectares of old trees around a Directoire house, left to the wildlife

In history

Selling as a first growth by 1868, under M. Grandet; 26 hectares in 1893; Charles Montouroy from July 1907