Berthollier Chignin VV

Jacquère

Savoie, France

The Bertholliers come from a long wine-making tradition; growers, owners and winemakers for several generations dating back to 1850. Today, brothers Denis and Didier own several parcels on the southernmost and steepest parts of the Savoie hills whose abrupt slopes, too difficult to work on, had been abandoned by their forefathers at the beginning of the 20th century. But this is the terrain where the grapes thrive.

Their grandfather Marius maintained a mix of farming and livestock, in addition to vines. His daughter Monique then took over and married Denis and Didier’s father, Alexis Berthollier, himself the son of winemaker. They abandoned polyculture to devote their activity fully to the vines. Alexis father, Victor Berthollier, who was winemaker at Aprement, was probably the first winemaker to bottle Savoyard wine for the mass-market in 1970! Denis and Didier harvest, vinify and do the bottling themselves at the domain. They have eliminated the use of insecticides and fungicides in all their vines and ceased the use of weed-killer since 2008, enabling grass to grow in the rocky slope vineyards. They use only naturally occurring, indigenous yeasts and very minimal SO2.