Quiet as a mouse: meet St-Émilion’s shy sibling

Fronsac, one of the trio of Bordeaux right bank fine wine regions, draws far less attention than its siblings, St-Émilion and Pomerol. But now it’s tired of being ignored, writes Roger Morris. Unlike its two neighbours to the east, Fronsac doesn’t make a lot of noise. For centuries, it has been linked together with St-Émilion and Pomerol as the go-to fine wine regions of Bordeaux’s right bank, yet it’s been the other two who in modern times have always been the ones dancing centre-stage while Fronsac watched from the wings. During the post-war fine wine boom, St-Émilion was the first to capture the attention of wine collectors, wine tourists and plain old wine lovers with its medieval charm and waves of vineyards fanning out across its plateau and down the escarpments on either of its flanks. And, in recent years, it has had its share of media controversies and lawsuits about who is a grand cru and who isn’t. Meanwhile, Pomerol, not much of a visual beauty within its cramped quarters, nevertheless started to fascinate collectors with its clos-like châteaux and dazzling wines – so good, and so little of it. And remember all that early fuss about Le Pin, the first of the literal garage wines? Fronsac, along with its sub-region, Canon-Fronsac, is arguably the most attractive of the three, with its verdant, rolling hillside vineyards that would be right at home in the Loire Valley or even Tuscany. Additionally, as with most French wine regions, Fronsac traces its wine origins back centuries, and it claims Roman emperor Charlemagne and Cardinal Richelieu, chief minister to King Louis XIII of France, as early fans.

Derailed progress

But the devastations to Fronsac’s vineyards wrought by phylloxera derailed the progress of the area more than a century ago. For a variety of reasons, Fronsac did not recover as quickly as its two neighbours, and, partly as a result, its profile remains less well-known than theirs. Additionally, a river – the Isle – runs between Fronsac and Pomerol and St-Émilion, separating it physically and perhaps psychologically from the other two. As with most things in life, this separation has had good and bad ramifications. The good is that Fronsac retains a rural charm that is somewhat lacking in its bustling, more crowded cohorts. But its solitude has also caused its wines to be in less demand, especially at the super-premium level. However, a growing number of Fronsac wine growers are beginning to change that, attracting attention from savvy fine wine investors, as well as tourists fleeing the crowds on the eastern side of the Isle. “We do not strive to be a best-kept secret,” says Sally Evans, who purchased a three-hectare estate in 2017 and re-named it Château George 7. “As an ex-corporate marketer – Accenture for 16 years – I am frustrated at the lack of visibility of Fronsac, and I believe with more and more wine tourism in the appellation, then groups will be drawn to spend a whole day here instead of staying around St-Émilion.”

“We need to explain that Fronsac and Canon-Fronsac are the nuggets of the Bordeaux region,” agrees Jean-Yves Millaire, co-owner of the 38-hectare Château Lamarche Canon, “thanks to their exposure, their size, the quality and homogeneity of their wines and terroir, and their passionate, open-minded and welcoming winemakers.” Today, there are about 731 hectares of vines in Fronsac, according to the Bordeaux Wine Council (CIVB), slightly less than the 774ha recorded in 2020 – a decline of some concern among local vintners – with about 140 wine-producing estates. Fronsac’s exact production in bottles is more difficult to ascertain, as only its red wines are labelled “Fronsac PDO”, while the growing number of white wines, sparkling wines and rosés hailing from Fronsac are all counted within the muchlarger Bordeaux PDO. The CIVB marks current annual Fronsac red wine sales at about 3 million bottles, versus 3.1m bottles in 2020.

Singular soil

The grape varieties grown are the same as in the rest of Bordeaux, although the terroirs are somewhat different. “Fronsac thrives on a singular soil, mostly made of so-called ‘molasse du fronsadais’, dating back to the Palaeocene era and on a very hilly and beautiful terroir,” explains Esther Hermouet, proprietor of the 22hectare Clos du Roy. Within that ‘molasse’ is a varying mixture of limestone and clay, and, because of the rivers’ confluence and prehistoric erosion, there is a fair amount of alluvial soil nearer the Dordogne. “With their eastern and northern exposure, the Fronsadais hillsides have the advantage of giving the wines greater freshness in these times of global warming,” explains Oriane Sallé de Chou, co-director of the 19-hectare Château de Carles/Haut-Carles. “Fronsac is a magnificent illustration of the great diversity of Bordeaux wines,” says noted wine merchant Allan Sichel, who also heads the Bordeaux Wine Council. “The wines are often rich, fresh, round and deep. Fronsac offers a fabulous range of discoveries full of character and is well worth a visit.” As Millaire and Evans note, there are simultaneous – and sometimes conflicting – desires on the part of Fronsac producers, many of them from the outside or younger generations of traditional estates, to both produce affordable wines with welcoming venues for tourists, while at the same time improving the quality and prices of its best wines to match those of its two highly regarded neighbours. Sallé de Chou sees progress being made with both approaches. “The Fronsac committee has put in a lot of efforts to dynamise the appellation,” she says, “organising tastings for local consumers such as Apero des Vins de Fronsac, gathering samples for professional tasters and developing its social media.” However, she adds: “It’s not enough yet. On a second level, 12 Fronsac wine producers have formed an association, Expression de Fronsac. All the members are good friends and share the same idea that, when it comes to wine, we should talk about quality, not reputation or labels.”

Outside investment

One of those 12 members is Château Gaby, a 13-hectare property that represents a growing trend of outside investment in Fronsac, having been sold by a Canadian investor in 2016 to American billionaire Thomas Sullivan. “We pulled out some old hillside Merlot vines that had rootstock that was not efficient and replaced them with Cabernet Franc,” says estate director Damien Landouar. “It’s a good grape for the future with global warming, and it has a late harvest.” According to Landouar, “about 50% of Fronsac vineyards are owned by investors, including French investors”. Chinese investors have purchased three prominent properties – Châteaux de la Rivière, Richelieu and Plain Point. “Plain Point started with 30-40 hectares and now has about 100ha, with a large, new cellar,” says Landouar. In fact, Plain Point is the kind of opulent showcase one would expect to see in Napa Valley, Pauillac – or St-Émilion. As Hermouet of Clos du Roy points out, existing estates need similar levels of investment, but the prices their wines currently fetch don’t always allow it. “Is it a matter of terroir or a matter of money?” she asks rhetorically. “It’s money. We have a great terroir, but the question is: how much can you invest? And it’s not just investment in technology. It’s also employing people. In 2024, for example, we would have liked to have removed leaves to improve grape quality, but we didn’t have the people to do it.”

Superior terroir

In theory, the Canon-Fronsac sub-region that is mostly adjacent to the Dordogne is the superior terroir, but most wine critics believe that no one area within Fronsac can claim superior soil. For example, a number of prominent producers are clustered on the plateau and hills around the small village of Saillans, including Dalem, Villars, George 7, Clos du Roy, Les Trois Croix, Moulin Haut-Laroque and Fontenil, owned by Michel Rolland. With their historic business connections, Fronsac and Canon-Fronsac châteaux export about 6.6 hectolitres, or 25% of their production, with many producers trading on La Place de Bordeaux. China is the largest market, followed by the US, Germany, Belgium and the UK. Some larger producers, such as Château de la Dauphine, export more. About 85% of the property’s 250,000-bottle annual production is sold through La Place, says director Stéphanie Barousse.

Perched on a plateau: Château George 7 As elsewhere, climate change and sustainability are primary concerns of Fronsac growers, especially when it comes to selection of varieties within the limits of the Bordeaux appellation. “Of course, climate change is affecting our vines, and one grape variety in particular, Merlot, is very sensitive to mildew and heat, which is why we decided several years ago to diversify our grape varieties,” says Millaire of Lamarche Canon. “Today we have reoriented the grape varieties of our vineyard by significantly increasing the proportion of Cabernet Franc by 20% more in less than 10 years,” says Barousse. Additionally, Malbec – which had once been largely abandoned by Bordeaux – is making a comeback in some Fronsac vineyards. As Barousse points out, Fronsac may be better-suited to climate change than most Bordeaux appellations. “We are a terroir that is not very subject to frost, thanks to the protection of the Dordogne river,” she explains. “Excess water is managed because our vines are planted on hillsides that facilitate water drainage, and the limestone soil plays a moderating role in the excesses of the heatwaves in summer. Vines deeply anchored in the rock produce healthy, ripe and balanced grapes.” These producers believe that they have a great terroir that, with increasing investment, is giving them something to shout about – a way to break out of its solitude. “I have seen so much change since I moved here just six years ago,” says George 7’s Evans. “Now we want to project that more to the wine consumer. We don’t have a lot of resources to do that – money or time – but there is now a core group of us who are dedicated to getting Fronsac on the map. We are about quality, from the terroir, to the wines, to the style of welcome, but with the human touch – wines with a story and a face.”