France | Languedoc-Roussillon | Chateau La Baronne
Chateau La Baronne
Wines
Summary
Château La Baronne, an estate representing several winemaking generations, is nestled in the foothills of Montagne d’Alaric, a massif encompassing an extraordinary natural ecosystem in Corbières, the largest AOC in Languedoc-Roussillon. The mountain is an imposing clay and limestone mass with a vast reservoir of underground water - a blessing in the local Mediterranean climate which is dry, hot, and very windy. The vines of the estate are planted at an altitude of between 100 and 200 m on a wide variety of terraces, valleys and gravel hillsides, with the soils comprised of limestone, clay, and sandstone formations.
Purchased by André and Suzette Lignières in 1957, Château La Baronne released its first vintage in the 1970s and since then has gradually expanded to extend the vineyard to 90 hectares of vines and 20 hectares of garrigue, woodland, and olive groves. Now operated by the original owners’ grandchildren Jean and Anne, the La Baronne vineyard is planted on limestone, clay, and sandstone terroir, which forces the old-vine Carignan, Grenache, Syrah, and Mourvèdre vines to struggle and dig deep.
Not using any synthetic chemical products in the vineyards has always been the unspoken rule of the Lignères family, a “union minimum”, but Jean decided to formalize this practice and propelled the estate to organic certification in 2007. Not finding organic practice to be enough to correct imbalances due to years of monoculture, the estate converted to biodynamics in 2012 and is now certified by Demeter.
Despite climate change, which in this region is marked by an increase in evapo-transpiration, the vines no longer suffer from water stress in summer. The living soils, rich in micro-organisms, with their diverse plant cover, play their role as a buffer, retaining water better and resulting in healthy vines and grapes. The estate's grapes ripen earlier, taste fresher, and have a lower concentration of sugars, with a lower potential alcohol content and therefore a better balance.
The grape varieties are typical of the Corbières: Carignan (more than 120 years old for some plots), Grenache noir, Syrah, Mourvèdre and Cinsault for the reds, Grenache blanc and gris, Roussanne and Vermentino for the whites.