Château Cos d'Estournel
Château Cos d'Estournel
【A palace of Saint-Estèphe, dressed in an oriental dream】
Travel north through the Médoc and stop at the boundary with Pauillac, and what meets the eye is a row of spired pagodas. This is France — so why does an eastern palace rise here? The answer lies in the dream of the man who built the place two centuries ago.
Louis Gaspard d'Estournel founded Château Cos d'Estournel, planting his vines on this hill in 1811. His approach was heretical by the standards of Bordeaux at the time: he bypassed the négociants altogether, bottling at his own château and shipping directly to his customers. His wines came to grace the tables of princes in India and Arabia, and the greater part of every vintage sailed east. Enthralled by the Orient, he brought its motifs home and raised a château like no other, crowned with pagodas and carved ornament. The "Maharajah of Saint-Estèphe", people called him, and they meant it as a tribute. The elephant standing at the gate still tells the story to this day.
The vineyard covers 91 hectares along the Pauillac border. Its soils hold less clay and more pebbles than those of its neighbours, draining freely and storing warmth, which gives the fruit real depth of concentration. Cool Atlantic winds slow the ripening, so the harvest comes later here than elsewhere in the Médoc — and complexity and refinement are burnished in the extra time. The vines average thirty-five years of age, and a few old Merlot plots have passed the century mark.
When the Swiss businessman Michel Reybier took over in 2000, a state-of-the-art gravity-flow winery was installed and quality leapt to another level. The 2009 vintage earning a perfect 100 points from Robert Parker was perhaps the emblem of that ascent.
In the glass, a deep purple-crimson gives way to blackcurrant and blackberry, spice, and a beguiling note of oriental incense woods. Fine, supple tannins and taut acidity build a structure that fully justifies the estate's reputation as a "super second" among the Second Growths. Pour a glass and travel, for a while, through the story this palace tells.
