Château Tour Haut-Caussan

The château

The Courrians have lived at Blaignan since 1634. On July 8, 1877 Jean and Jeanne Courrian paid 29,748 francs for 4.2 hectares of vines and the windmill, the Moulin de Courrian, a holding that Charles Cocks and Édouard Féret’s Bordeaux et ses vins, the reference book of the Bordeaux trade, had listed as a Cru Bourgeois since 1868; the name Tour-Haut-Caussan first appears in a merchant’s contract in 1909. In 1929 the family added a 2nd terroir, 15 hectares on the plateau of Potensac. Edmond Courrian handed the estate to his son Philippe in 1965, and Philippe to his children, Véronique and Fabien Courrian, in 2007. The mill of 1734, restored by the Compagnons du Devoir, was inaugurated in working order in 1981, and its half-timbered tower in 2005; a 2nd barrel cellar opened in 2004. Since 1992 the family has also owned Château Cascadais, in the Corbières.

The vines grow on the clay and limestone slope of Blaignan and, at Ordonnac, on Pyrenean gravel over red clay, 30 meters up on the plateau of Potensac. They are planted close, 1 meter by 1.5, with no chemical fertilizer and no spray against rot, and the soil is worked in 6 passes a year. The grapes are picked by hand, destemmed and fermented plot by plot in 11 small cement vats: 2 to 3 days cooled to 12°C, then fermentation at 25°C to 28°C, with at least 3 weeks on the skins. The whole crop then goes into barrel, 25% of them new, in 2 cellars holding 400 barrels, and is racked 3 times in the year. About 80,000 bottles are made and all of them are sold direct, half abroad; the 2nd wine, Château La Landotte, comes from 3 hectares on the plateau of Potensac, about 13,000 bottles.

At a glance

Appellation

Médoc

Commune

Blaignan-Prignac

Classification

No classification

Owners

The Courrian family, since 1877; Véronique and Fabien Courrian, since 2007

Soil

Clay and limestone at Blaignan; Pyrenean gravel over red clay at Ordonnac Terroir of Médoc →

Farming

No chemical fertilizer, no anti-rot spray; soil worked in 6 passes a year

Cellar

Picked by hand; 11 cement vats; 100% in barrel, 25% new

Production

About 80,000 bottles, all sold direct; Château La Landotte, about 13,000

Wines

Château Tour Haut-Caussan; Château La Landotte

The house

Also Château Cascadais, Corbières

The Moulin de Courrian

Built in 1734; in working order again since 1981