Welcome to Libourne, 40km east of Bordeaux. Surrounded by vineyards as far as the eye can see in the valley of a thousand châteaux, suddenly, a small wooden sign indicates our destination. At the end of a long alley of cedars Pierre Lurton, Director of Château Cheval Blanc, is waiting for us.

Château Cheval Blanc is renowned throughout the world as an exceptional wine. This Saint-Emilion, with its similarities to Pomerol and its unconventional grape varieties spread over 53 difference plots, has been making its mark since 1832. In this first episode, we discover the place, history and geography of Cheval Blanc and we meet the people who work on this legendary terroir from day to day.

Forty-five plots within a single property, a living mosaic. This mosaic is composed of three different types of soil: from fine textured soils with clay to coarser textured soils with gravel. A unique terroir made primarily of clay and small pepples in certain plots and of fine gravel and sand on others.

The grapes were brought in 3 weeks ago. Alcoholic fermentation is taking place in the vats at the heart of the magnificent 6,000 m2 cellar designed by Christian de Portzampac. It’s the moment of vinification. Each of these majestic concrete tanks is filled with the grapes from one specific plot.

The entire bulk of the harvest goes into the vats; skin, pips, juice and pulp which, after successive pumping overs, fermentation and maceration will become wine.

Every day, in the tasting room overlooking the cellars, we taste, discuss, compare and test. Fifty plots, fifty bottles on the table. Each of the different expressions of the estate which will be blended to reveal the best possible version of Cheval Blanc. Red fruit, violet, rose petals and the promise of freshness and elegance of another Cheval are already there.

Autumn slowly turns into winter. As the stages of vinification and blending progress, the technical team begin to glimpse what will be Château Cheval Blanc 2020. It is time for the vintage to enter the slow, dormant stage known as ‘barrel ageing’. The 4^th episode of Inside Château Cheval Blanc takes you from the Darnajou cooperage where some of the château’s barrels are crafted by hand to the basement of the winery where the barrels are filled, marking the beginning of the long journey the wine will take before being bottled.

In the deep mid-winter, when the plants are dormant and the wines are sleeping gently in the cellars, work on the soils at Château Cheval Blanc begins. On that morning we witness a slightly unusual delivery; hundreds of fruit and forest trees are unloaded from a lorry.  Viticultural assistant Juliette Combe overseas the operation. Apple, plum, pear and peach trees, blackberry bushes, elm, hornbeam and maple trees will be planted around the perimeters and amongst the vines. In total, over 2,000 trees will be planted throughout the domain. 16 hectares of ‘jouala’ to add to the total of 100 or so hectares currently found in France’s vineyards.

Inside Château Cheval Blanc is also about the evolution of farming methods and adaptation to climatic changes through a vast agroecological project which, slowly but surely, is changing the physiognomy of the domain. Agroforestry combined with the introduction of cover crops to replace ploughing as well as polyculture and animal husbandry to re-establish links with the history and roots of Cheval Blanc and to cultivate and pass on living soils.

This morning a winter sun rises above the bare vines. The wine growers are already working the four corners of the domain. Since they were last harvested, the vines have been pruned regularly in preparation for the spring budburst. On each plot, twigs are removed and the vines pruned; each cut of the secateur by expert hands a promise of the development of the future bunches of grapes. At Château Cheval Blanc pruning is mixed guyot style. Each year, the wine growers work on ‘their’ plots bringing their own individual pruning techniques, style and experience.

Massal selection and the evolution of grafting techniques is also part of the work in the vineyard. Château Cheval Blanc cultivates its own selections and monitors them on the terroir where they will be introduced. Today we are planting the massal selection from 1992 and preparing the selection for 2030. A living heritage which needs to be prepared, protected and, most importantly, passed on for future generations.

It happened in 1956, 1961,1991 and then in 2017, 2019 and 2021: episodes of frost and anxiety for the wine growers who saw the temperatures falling and, with those, the risk of losing all or part of their harvest.

It’s common knowledge that 2021 was a dark year for viticulture. Experts estimate losses of 20-40% of the harvest on a national level. 15-20 million hectolitres. Lost.

It is expensive to buy paraffin candles and air blowers and only a small number of properties have access to them. This aside, they help to gain a few degrees on the ground and this was the choice made by Cheval Blanc after 2017. That year the domain’s team went through a particularly hard spring and they remember it well……

Frost as well as drought, heavy rainfall, hail…these are the indicators the team at Château Cheval Blanc remember each vintage by. The climate is changing, humans adapt to get wine in the bottle, every year.  Inside Château Cheval Blanc.

It’s the end of the journey. The wine has been bottled and soon it will join the cellars of wine enthusiasts all over the world.

A few years later, a few decades later, what will happen to this strange alchemy once it is poured into the glass?

In this last episode of Inside Château Cheval Blanc, in the quiet of the cellars Head Sommelier, Estelle Touzet and Cheval Blanc’s Director, Pierre Lurton taste the legendary vintages which impacted most on the life of the domain. Tobacco, gingerbread, violets, cherry, depth, humility…The art of the sommelier is to participate in tastings and find words for this mythical juice whilst passing on stories about its history and its terroir from the wine grower to the consumer.   Before they arrive in the cellars of a restaurant or a private client, the first step in the life of the wines lies in the hands of the Bordeaux brokers who sell ‘en primeur’ to French and international clients.

Inside Château Cheval Blanc may begin.