A Bordeaux native who has lived in or around Lyon since 1979, Eric is a jovial, energetic and fun-loving person who wants his wines to make their drinkers happy. But he is also a boundary pusher, endlessly questioning his own work for the sake of moving viticulture and winemaking forward.
Eric is a trailblazer, having put the all but extinct regions of Brézème and Saint Julien en Saint Alban on the map. He experiments with concepts you rarely if ever hear about elsewhere: finding acidity in Marsanne through anforas, not working the soil in favor of cover crops, “infusion” style macerations, working on his own grafts, rediscovering forgotten grapes adaptable to the very real threat of climate change…
He originally became a winemaker after a first career as an engineer in the nuclear industry and without any family background in vines or wines. As such, his goals and methods developed not so much from his years of schooling, but from his readings, his visiting winemakers around the world, and working in Burgundy with Jean-Marie Guffens at Verget.
After giving up the idea of buying vineyards, which was too costly a proposition for a beginner with his ambitions, he started a small négoce where he selected particularly interesting vineyard plots worked by the sincere, hard-working farmers who grew the healthy grapes he wanted to buy and vinify. He rediscovered nearly forgotten areas of ancient fame, like Brézème in the northern Côtes-du-Rhône, and nurtured relationships with people who tend their vines with passion and care. Over the years, the shift from négociant to vigneron has occurred, and today Eric owns and rents the vast majority of the vines that go into his production. He has also replanted several hectares in Brézème and in Saint-Julien en Saint-Alban with Syrah and Roussanne.
As a land owner and vigneron, he produces 12 different wines from four different origins, with the Côte Rotie, Rasteau and Châteauneuf du Pape the only remaining cuvées made with purchased fruit.
Like all good winemakers, Eric strongly believes that wines are made in the vineyard, and that his work, after the harvest, consists in following the lead of the vintage and accompanying the wines so they fulfill their potential. Exact steps in vinification vary according to the varietals, terroirs and vintages, but the goal is always to provide the grapes, musts and wines with the best environment and to intervene as little as possible.
His techniques for white wines include sorting in the vines and at the winery, whole clusters pressed in a vertical press (that’s the old fashioned wood kind), no added yeasts, barrel, concrete and ceramic fermentation (no new wood), aging on fine lees, malolactic fermentation for all the wines, minimal use of SO2 at bottling only, no pump-overs, fining and filtration only when absolutely necessary.
For his red wines, he does the same sorting at harvest, no destemming most of the time, bringing the grapes to the press by conveyor belts, cold maceration under a CO2 blanket for aromatic extraction, natural yeasts, very little to no extraction during maceration and fermentation. The temperatures are controlled not to exceed 34 degrees C (93F), aging is done mostly in concrete, old foudres and demi-muids of 450L, no filtration and egg white fining in extremely rare cases.
- Côtes du Rhône Roussanne Brézème
- Côtes du Rhône Brézème Rouge
- Côtes du Rhône Villages Rouge St-Julien en St-Alban
- Châteauneuf-du-Pape Blanc Vieilles Vignes
- Vin de France Rouge Chat Fou
- Côte-Rôtie Vieilles Vignes