Clos des Capucins, 2019 Chinon
Before starting her journey as a vigneronne, Fiona Beeston developed a passion for wine at an early age, which led to an accomplished career both as a wine merchant and wine writer. After working her first harvest in Bordeaux in 1976, she later worked for the great Steven Spurrier at his Caves de la Madeleine in Paris, and also as a buyer for the renowned caviste Lucien Legrand. During her time as a wine merchant, she also began writing and for two decades had a regular column in France's leading wine publication, La Revue du Vin de France. But it was in the early years in her career in particular where she spent some time travelling across France meeting and tasting with vignerons, and became quite fond of the Loire Valley, and later developed a special friendship with Chinon's own, Charles Joguet, who's wines were a revelation to her in those early years. So, when it came time to shift gears professionally and the opportunity to purchase Clos des Capucins came available, she was assured by Charles that this was an exceptional terroir and an opportunity not to be missed. So, in 2010, she took the leap and became propriétaire-vigneronne of Clos des Capucins, and her first vintage was 2011. Quickly realizing that he vision Clos des Capulcins required a bit of patience, in 2012 she purchased a 1-hectare vineyard a few kilometers away from Clos des Capucins from which she is making an early-drinking style of Chinon, which she calls her Fiona Beeston Perfectly Drinkable Chinon.
The clos takes its name from the order of Capuchin monks that first established themselves in France in 1574. Over time, the monks began to establish smaller chapters of the Capuchin order across France and it is believed that they settled here in Chinon in 1604 establishing a convent and grounds where the clos is today, just a couple hundred metres from the Chinon fortress. As was customary of monastic traditions, wine was central to their faith and part of their daily rituals and routines, so it is believed that these monks were among the first to cultivate grape vines here.
Among the convent's most illustrious residents was father François Leclerc du Tremblay who resided at the convent in the 1610s. Père Joseph, as he became known, rose to power alongside Cardinal Richelieu, chief secretary of King Louis the XIII. Unbeknownst to many, Père Joseph wielded his powers of influence to eventually become right-hand-man to Richelieu, who was one of the most powerful people in France at the time. Père Joseph is widely regarded as the original eminence grise, or grey eminence, a term that has been used throughout history to refer to someone who is a powerful adviser or decision maker who operates "behind the scenes."
Following the French Revolution, as with all things relating to the church, the convent and grounds were dismantled and the land sold off. It wasn't until the 19th century that the original parcels of land of the clos were later resembled under the Napoleonic register to become what is now the Clos des Capucins. Following phylloxera, it is presumably a gentleman named Charles Moreau who re-planted the clos with some of the Cabernet Franc vines that still remain today, but there is little evidence of any significant winemaking activity taking place here during much of the 20th century. Fast forward to the modern era, and Rodolphe Raffault of Domaine Jean-Maurice Raffault was under contract to manage the vineyard and make the wines from 2001 to 2007, and then the clos was sold Domaine Baudry-Dutour in 2008. But that tenure that didn't amount to much because they, too, eventually put the clos up for sale, which was then purchased by Fiona in 2010.
So today's wine takes us to the Chinon commune - one I have spoken in great detail about in previous videos thanks to its wealth of historic and highly regarded lieux-dits, like Clos des Capucins, dotted across its viticultural landscape. That said, it bears repeating some of the key details about this commune's viticultural features. Though there are vineyards on both sides of the Vienne River, the majority of the commune's vineyards are on the north side of the Vienne, which about 4km from north to south and about 6km from east to west, with vineyards dotted around the perimeter of the Chinon village itself.
The topography of the commune undulates and we have quite a variability in terms of exposures and altitudes. In terms of exposures, there are north, south, east and west facing slopes and everything in between. And in terms of elevation, most of the vineyards hover between 40m and upwards to 100m above sea level, and this elevation is significant as it gives us an indication as to what terroirs we find where.
In the eastern part of the commune, we find Chinon's premier côte and the vineyards to the north and above the premier côte. The premier côte is the first in a series of several pockets of sloping vineyards stretch from the eastern side of the Chinon commune all the way east across the communes of Cravant-Les-Côteaux and into Panzoult. This is where we find a number of highly regarded sites such as Clos de l'Olive, Chêne Vert, Clos Guillot, Coteau de Noiré and others. And these vineyards are for the most part on the Upper Turonian yellow tuffeau, with shallow topsoils that can have a mix of textures. To the north and quite literally above the premier côte at elevations ranging from 80 to 100m above sea level is where we find pockets of mostly deeper clays mixed with flint from the Senonian-age that are known locally as Cornuelles or also Perruches depending on the pedologoical composition of the soils.
Now, moving west very, close to the Chinon fortress in the heart of the village, we find a cluster of vineyards that sit up higher in elevation, around 80 to upwards to 100m above sea level. Similarly to the vineyards in the eastern part of the commune, at these elevations we find Cornuelles and Perruches, along with other types of clays mixed with flint from the Bartonian age.
To the west and to the north of the Chinon village itself, the majority of the vineyards follow the perimeter of the highest points in the village and hover at elevations between 55 and 80m above sea level. These vineyards are dominated by the influence of the Upper Turonian yellow tuffeau chalk, with pockets of millarges and other alterations of the yellow tuffeau depending on where you are, and the topsoils across the western and northern parts of the commune can be quite varied in terms of texture. It is here, in the western part of the commune, stretching a little over a kilometre from the Chinon fortress, we find another important côte, much like the one in the eastern part of the commune, where we find a cluster of vineyards, many of which have historical and/or religious significance, including Clos des Capucins, as well as Clos de l'Hospice, Clos de la Lysardière, Saint-Louans, Satis, and Clos du Parc.
Looking at Clos des Capucins a bit more closely, viticulturally speaking. This is a 1.3 hectare true walled clos divided into four parcels. The parcels sit on an east-facing slope, directly face the Chinon fortress, which is about 250m away, its a slope of moderate steepness ranging in elevations from around 63 to about 80m above sea level. There are two small parcels towards the bottom of the slope, directly above the Clos de l'Hospice, where we find the oldest vines of the clos, around 90 to 100 years of age, which Fiona uses as the source of her vine materials for replantings via massale selection. Here the soils are quite shallow, with a clayey-sand topsoil over the Upper Turonian yellow tuffeau, which has a little influence of millarges. The two parcels at the top of the slope, to the west of the original buildings, have some younger vines that are around 45 years of age, and these soils are a bit deeper and richer in texture, but less than 100cm before we hit the yellow tuffeau chalk again. In terms of farming, a huge proponent of biodynamics, Fiona converted the vineyard to biodynamic viticulture upon arriving at Clos des Capucins.
In terms of winemaking, the yields from the clos are quite low, around 15-17hl/ha on average. The fruit is all hand-harvested, hand-sorted, and hand-destemmed. The whole berries are fermented in 50hl oak foudres with indigenous yeast. The total time on skins is around one month to six weeks depending on the vintage, with very little by way of extractive techniques, just a little pumping over occasionally as needed. The wine is aged in used barrels from DRC (Domaine de la Romanée-Conti), and the aging is for around 2 years in the same tuffeau cellars the monks would've used for winemaking more than 400 years ago.
Key wine facts below:
Producer: Clos des Capucins (Fiona Beeston)
Appellation: Chinon
Commune: Chinon
Lieu-Dit: Clos des Capucins
Soil: Shallow clayey-sand over the Upper Turonian yellow tuffeau chalk
Alcohol: 13.2%
