The Faulkner family bought their estate complete with 24ha of vines and tumbledown Provencal manor house in 1989, with no grand winemaking ambitions. Yet in their first year, their wines earned four gold medals from France's top winemaking competitions, and their oenologist quickly convinced them to bottle their own wine instead of following the usual Provence path of selling it in bulk. International acclaim started flooding in for their passion project almost overnight!
Their son Julian took over in 2000, and the estate has since gone from strength to strength. With extensive developments in the vineyards and winery and further planting, Julian's focus since has been to produce a rose that could be considered as a true fine wine, and distinctive from the typical Provençal style. The hard work and experimentation has paid off- in 2015, Decanter magazine selected their 2014 rosé as best rosé in the world, as well as the range catching the attention of none other than the queen of vino herself, Jancis Robinson, who has included their wines in no less than 3 of her top 10 lists for the year.
Located in the foothills of the Massif des Maures, the stunning estate is like something out of a Romcom - surrounded by pine trees, olive groves and dry stone terraces, and with the buzz of cicadas in the air. Sustainability and the protection of their beautiful environment has been at the forefront of their mission since 2002, when they were a handful of Provence producers to be the first to go down that path. In 2020, they gained their HVE sustainable certification. HVE or ‘Haute Valeur Environnementale‘ – High Environmental Value focuses on four key areas: biodiversity conservation, flora protection strategy, management of fertiliser use and conservation of water use. Although not organic, they favour many of the same practices, limiting the use of pesticides and fertilizers (ideally compost) and if they do have to spray, always capturing any runoff and treating it in the same way as winery waste. All electricity used is from renewable sources, and they're working hard to move towards being carbon neutral.
