ALL CHANGE
Take 2,000 years of winemaking, throw in some French bureaucracy, and you can see why it’s easy to get the impression that things move pretty slowly in Bordeaux. It’s not true, of course. It’s almost impossible to keep up with the number of changes that happen here every year. Let’s just take it from January 2019 until today.
At a very quick glance, I could talk about the arrival of Australian giants Treasury Wine Estates, owner of Penfolds, with the purchase of Château Cambon La Pelouse. Or the sale of two classified Margaux estates: Château Cantenac Brown, from British businessman Simon Halabi to Frenchman Tristan Le Lous; and Château Dauzac, from French insurance group MAIF to Breton businessman Christian Rolleau. Or even another Margaux, in the shape of Château La Tour de Mons going from CA Grands Crus to the Perrodo family of Château Marquis d’Alesme.
On a winemaker level, there was movement from Château Haut-Bailly in Pessac-Léognan over to St-Emilion’s La Dominique for Yann Monties, and from Château Clerc Milon down the road to Mouton
