The Wine: Poulsard Rosé 2020
La Grange 476 Poulsard Rosé 2020.
The Producer: La Grange 476
La Grange 476 is a small upstart winery led by Dimitri Vetrois and Marion Valverde located in Menétru-Le-Vignoble, which sits in the appellation of Château-Chalon in the Jura. Here's an abstract from a longer interview with the winemakers by importer Varda Wine.
Can you tell me about where you are from and a little bit about your lives before you started La Grange 476?
Marion is originally from Auvergne. She studied to be a nurse in the Berry where she worked for a while. After arriving in the Jura together in 2019, she continued working as a nurse until March 2020, when she started a course on the agricultural uses of animal power. This meant we could introduce horses into our vineyards. Afterward, Marion bought a horse named Solferino that has been working in the vines with us since March 2020. Dimitri comes from the Berry. He started doing vineyard and cellar work in a biodynamic domaine called Rippon Vineyards in New Zealand in 2009. He then went on to do a BTS Viticole (wine studies) in Beaune, after which he worked in Sancerre, Bourgogne, and Limoux.
Can you describe the terroir that you are working in? How many hectares are you farming, and with which grape varieties?
We farm 4 hectares of vines consisting of Poulsard, Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and Savagnin. All of our vines are less than 5km away from our house, so they all express a little bit of the magic that makes the Chateau-Chalon terroir so special. That being, a gray marl bedrock covered by soil composed of clay and pebbly limestone. The vines also vary in orientation. We have parcels exposed to the west, east, and south.
The Region: Jura