Château Montrose
Château Montrose is a famous French winery in the Bordeaux wine region . It is in the classification of 1855 as a Grand Cru listed Classé (Deuxieme Cru).
It is located in a beautiful hillside location above the Gironde estuary , in the Saint-Estèphe area in the Médoc appellation , about 60 km north-west of Bordeaux . The estate has belonged to the Charmoluë family since 1896 and was taken over by Martin and Olivier Bouygues (see also the French Bouygues group ) in 2006 .
The vineyards cover 69 hectares and are 65% with the grape variety Cabernet Sauvignon , 25% Merlot, 8% Cabernet Franc and 2% Petit Verdot . The vines are on average 45 years old. The total production of the estate amounts to approx. 350,000 bottles of wine per year, of which approx. 40% is accounted for by the second wine “La Dame de Montrose”.
Because of this extremely solid working method and the comparable, massive style, Montrose is also known as "The Latour of St. Estèphe".
The wine
Montrose works extremely reliably and in an old craft tradition. In very good years, high-class wine is also reliably produced, which is by no means always possible at every well-known winery. Nevertheless, the wine is usually much cheaper (if you can say this at prices of 40 to 50 € / bottle) than similar first-class wines. This is mainly due to the fact that Château Montrose does not follow the modern tendencies towards more fruity and earlier maturing wines and thus appears to perform worse in comparative tastings in the first years after the harvest. This picture changes, however, in comparisons, after 5–6 years of maturity at the earliest. In general, it can be said that Montrose wine should be stored for at least 10 years, but preferably around 15 years before it is consumed.
The best wine so far (as of 2005) is the 1990 vintage , which Robert Parker always rated as perfect with 100 PP and regularly beats first-class neighbors at tastings . The wines of 2000 and (in some cases controversial) 2003 should also develop excellently; the 2003 is currently rated with 96 to 100 PP, so with a chance of perfection. The 2009 vintage has also recently become available, which, according to the unanimous opinion of the tasters, is one of the largest Montrose ever produced (100 PP), but due to its massive tannins it will take decades before it is fully ready to drink.
Very old vintages of Montrose wines can also be outstanding, for example the 1961 vintage: If it is possible to find a bottle from correct storage at a consistently cool temperature. The 1970 and 1975 vintages (as of 2005) are not yet fully developed and should still be in storage.
At the legendary wine tasting in Paris in 1976 , the 1970 vintage took an excellent third place.
history
The history of the winery is comparatively young compared to other surrounding châteaux. Due to its location on the Gironde, the land was drained and made arable only late. The lands of today's Château Montrose were part of the huge possession of Calon and passed on March 6, 1778 by decision of the Parlement of Bordeaux from Alexandre de Ségur to Etienne Dumoulin. The ground, on a gravel knoll, was heather overgrown with dry grass. The heather, which blooms pink in spring, is said to have given the estate its name: mont rose, the pink mountain. Nothing is known about any activities by Etienne on his property. It was not until his son Théodore began to lay out vineyards in 1815 and in 1820 a mansion was already on the usable area. In 1824 he parted with much of Calon (he sold the land to Firmin de Lestapis) and kept only the part of Montrose that he had built on an old parcel called La Lande de l'Escargeon. Just eight years after separating from Calon, Dumoulin had 30 hectares of vineyards, which he constantly expanded through small acquisitions. In 1855 50 hectares were already under production. The quality efforts of Dumoulin were rewarded with the classification as Deuxième Grand Cru in the classification drawn up on the occasion of the world exhibition in 1855 .
When Théodore died in 1861, the property came to his two adoptive children, who, however, sold it to Mathieu Dollfus (1799–1887) five years later. Dollfus expanded the estate to 65 hectares, rebuilt the main building and modernized the attached farm. Shortly before his death, he founded the Société Viticole de Château Montrose , which was headed a little later by his son Charles Dollfus (1828-1907).
Hardly two years later Charles sold the estate on June 22, 1889 for 1.5 million francs to the brothers Jean-Justin and Jean-Jules Hostein. The two brothers already owned Château Cos d'Estournel . Jean-Jules quickly acquired the entire property, but sold it to his son-in-law Louis Victor Charmolüe in 1896. Louis Victor, who was born at Château Figeac , began to replant the vineyards that were badly affected by phylloxera and powdery mildew . Louis Victor Charmolüe himself managed the estate until 1925, his son Albe Charmolüe followed until his death in 1944. His wife and widow Yvonne Charmolüe managed the estate until 1960 and handed it over to Jean-Louis Charmolüe.
The Charmolüe era ended in 2006 when the estate was sold to the brothers Martin and Olivier Bouygues (see Bouygues ).
literature
- Charles Cocks, Edouard Féret, Bruno Boidron: Bordeaux et ses vins . 18th edition. Èdition Féret et Fils, Bordeaux 2007, ISBN 978-2-35156-013-6 .
- Horst Dippel : The wine lexicon . 3. Edition. Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1999, ISBN 3-596-13826-4 .
- Robert Parker : Parker's Wine Guide (= Collection Rolf Heyne ). Heyne, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-453-16305-2 .
