Château Saint-Georges

The château

Tradition puts a Gallo-Roman villa on the site, perhaps that of the poet Ausonius. In 1602 Henri IV sold Château Saint-Georges to Jean Barbot, a lawyer at the Parlement de Bordeaux, and in 1772 Victor Louis, the architect of the Grand Théâtre of Bordeaux, rebuilt it on the site of a feudal castle; it has been called the little Versailles of the Saint-Émilion country. Charles Cocks and Édouard Féret, whose Bordeaux et ses vins was the reference book of the Bordeaux trade, print it first among the proprietors of its commune from 1868, when its wines had sold new for up to 1,000 francs the tonneau (the old Bordeaux measure of a crop, 900 liters, or 4 barrels), and in 1886 they write that its wines, the first crus of the commune, had always fetched the prices of the second crus of Saint-Émilion. Pétrus Desbois, printed in the books as Desbois-Pétrus, owned it from 1893, at 230 tonneaux, and replanted the vineyard after phylloxera; by then 24 of its hectares had gone to the neighboring Saint-Georges-Macquin and Maisonneuve.

In 2013 Jean-Philippe Janoueix joined the Desbois family and became the principal owner. The 44 hectares of vines lie in one block on a hilltop 3 kilometers from Saint-Émilion, on clay and limestone facing south. The grand vin (the estate’s first wine) is 80% Merlot, 10% Cabernet Sauvignon and 10% Cabernet Franc, from vines 40 years old on average, aged 12 to 14 months in barrel, 30 to 40% new, and the estate makes 280,000 bottles. The second wine, Château Puy Saint-Georges, is 100% Merlot from the young vines, raised 15 months in vat.

At a glance

Appellation

Saint-Georges-Saint-Émilion

Commune

Montagne

Classification

No classification

Owner

Jean-Philippe Janoueix, principal owner since 2013, with the Desbois family

Vineyard

44 hectares in one block; vines 40 years old on average

Soil

Clay and limestone, facing south Terroir of Saint-Georges-Saint-Émilion →

Grapes

Merlot 80%, Cabernet Sauvignon 10%, Cabernet Franc 10%

Cellar

12 to 14 months in barrel, 30 to 40% new

Production

280,000 bottles

Wines

Château Saint-Georges; Château Puy Saint-Georges

The house

Rebuilt by Victor Louis in 1772

Not to be confused with

Château Saint-Georges Côte Pavie, in Saint-Émilion