Location and soils
Château d’Yquem is located in Sauternes in the French wine region Bordeaux. The estate extends across a diverse mosaic of different soils in Sauternes. The warm, dry topsoils contain rounded gravel stones and coarse rubble, while clay-containing subsoils store water. Numerous springs and around 100 kilometres of drainage pipes shape the vineyard’s drainage.
Vineyards and harvest
The vineyard area comprises 113 hectares, of which in a vintage around 100 hectares produce grapes. Roughly 75 percent of the vines are Sémillon and 25 percent Sauvignon Blanc. Sémillon is cut on spurs; with Sauvignon Blanc, around 90 percent is cut on spurs and 10 percent in the simple Guyot system. The estate uses organic fertiliser sparingly, forgoes chemical weed control, and regularly tills the soil and works the foliage by hand.
The Sauternes microclimate, linked to the Garonne Valley, can promote the development of Botrytis cinerea and the concentration of the grapes. The development responds to rainfall and drought: too much dryness can halt infection, too much rain can end concentration and increase the risk from the fungus. The botrytised grapes are picked in several passes at maximum concentration. Five or six passes over around six weeks are typical, and in some vintages more than ten. The average yield is about 9 hectolitres per hectare.
Wines and maturation
Château d’Yquem produces a sweet white wine from grapes concentrated by Botrytis cinerea, also known as noble rot. After the harvest, the grapes are taken to the cellar within around one hour, pressed three or four times, and fermented in new oak barrels. Selected lots mature after an initial separate maturation period of six to eight months for grapes picked on the same day, followed by around 20 months in barrel.
Y is an independent dry white wine from the same estate and vineyard. It usually consists mostly of Sauvignon Blanc and partly of Sémillon.
History
In 1593, Jacques Sauvage received the feudal fiefdom of Yquem; in 1711 the Sauvage family became the complete owners of the estate. Under Françoise Joséphine de Sauvage d’Yquem and her administrator Garos, a new wine cellar was created in 1826. In the Bordeaux classification of 1855, Château d’Yquem was ranked as the only Premier Cru Supérieur among the classified sweet white wines of Sauternes and Barsac. At the end of the 20th century, the estate was acquired by LVMH Moët Hennessy-Louis Vuitton.
