Maison & Domaines Les Alexandrins Condrieu 2017
(Northern Rhone, France) - [WS 93] [DM 93]

About the Winery:
Maison & Domaines Les Alexandrins is the story of three friends combining the savoir-faire they learned from their parents and grandparents and the fruits from beautiful and historic terroirs. Nicolas Jaboulet, the 6th generation of a winegrowing family in Tain l'Hermitage, Guillaume Sorrel, son of Marc Sorrel of Domaine Sorrel in Hermitage, and Alexandre Caso, a specialist in the terroirs of the Northern Rhône, joined forces in 2012. They began working parcel by parcel in Crozes-Hermitage for the wines of Maison Nicolas Perrin. In 2015, the name was changed to Maison & Domaines Les Alexandrins. Today, Maison & Domaines Les Alexandrins produces Northern Rhône wines that are true and classic expressions of the region.

About this Wine:

The wines from Condrieu have had an excellent reputation for many generations. The Popes in Avignon worshipped it, in the XVIth century the “Chapitre Lyonnais” offered it to his esteemed guests. More recently, Curnosky described it as one of the greatest white wines in France. Unfortunately, Phyloxera the first world war, the great depression in the thirties along with the industrialisation of the region were responsible for many to abandon their vineyard.

When the appellation of Condrieu was created in 1940, only three communes; Condrieu, Saint Michel and Vérin were included in the production area and totalled 170 hectares. In 1967, this was extended to four neighbouring villages; Chavanay, Saint Pierre de Boeuf, Malleval and Limony bringing it to 387 hectares. With increasing demand from the winegrowers and in view of keeping high quality wines, the area of plantation was reviewed one last time excluding any vines above an altitude of 300 meters. An agreement with the INAO brought the appellation down to 262 hectares. A quarter of the surface was withdrawn in order to only keep the hillside vines with the best exposure, where Viognier reaches its best maturity.

Tasting Notes:
The main stone found in Condrieu is granite. On the surface the soil is covered with decomposed granite and loess. This is soil is perfectly suited to Viognier and the vines benefit from excellent sunshine. When looking for winemaker collaborators, we wished to limit our research to Côteau de Cherry and Côteau de Rozay that have a bit of altitude and where the wines have a good balance and more importantly great freshness.

Vinification partly in tanks and partly in barrels of 225 litres. Maturing on fine lees for 8 months.

Ratings & Reviews

93 Points - Wine Spectator:
Plump and forward, offering an exotic mix of plantain, persimmon, apricot and white nectarine flavors, laced with a thread of bitter orange through the finish. Lots of fun. 80 cases imported.

93 Points - Decanter:
The winemaking team put the brakes on the rich fruity side of Viognier here, going for more sculpted and fine citrus zest, saffron and apricot pit characteristics. It has a tight frame and a sense of slate physicality in the mouth from those granite soils. It's aged half in barrel, half in vat for eight months, with no new oak. This vintage saw an extremely dry July and August, with just one day of rain over the whole two months, saved by a burst of 40mm falling in one day just before harvest. This will be bottled in September, and should age extremely well over the next five years. The grapes for Maison Les Alexandrins are grown on Côteau de Chéry – where Chapoutier makes a single vineyard bottling – and Côteau de Rozay on the higher slopes of the appellation