1st Growth winemakers marketing video winemakers, marketing, video, production, editing, wine, education, library, photography, 1st growth, first growth, winemakers, marketing video 230 hectares (575 acres) of vineyards produce, besides the straight village-Appellation Puligny, 13 Premiers crus Premiers crus crus Premiers crus crus crus Premiers Premiers crus crus crus Premiers crus crus Premiers crus and 5 Grands Crus. The big majority of the production is white (93 %). Domaine Jean Chartron owns 9 hectares (22.5 acres) of vineyards in Puligny-Montrachet and the neighbors villages, the major part of which being Premiers and Grands Crus. Clos de la Pucelle, Clos du Cailleret and les Folatières are located halfway up the hill and benefit from an excellent period of sunshine. Chevalier-Montrachet located on the upper slope of the hill, benefits from the best microclimatic conditions. Three exceptional named-places of the Montrachet hill bear a name that directly comes from the Middle Ages. One says that the Landlord of Puligny, " the Montrachet ", divided his land donated it to his children ; the eldest son, the Knight (le Chevalier), the daughter, the Maid (la Pucelle), and the illegitimate child (le Bâtard). Others are saying that "the Montrachet " has had another illegitimate child who, when a baby, was crying and making a lot of noise ; this could explain the name " Criots-Bâtard " given to a parcel of Grand Cru. Regarding the Clos du Cailleret, its name comes from its soil rich in limestone and various calcareous stones pebbles and shingles. The average age of all these vines is 40 years. Such a replanting policy enables, besides the quality of the wines, a regular yield. The grape harvests are manual at Domaine Jean Chartron, and the bunches are carried self-running off grape gondolas. All the necessary tests enabling the best success in achieving the vintage are made in the modern laboratory of the House Chartron & Trébuchet.
Winemaking is very much constrained by the grapevine itself, even given the necessary containers and the means of preservation. The wild vine is dioecious (meaning it has unisexual flowers on separate plants that must be pollinated by insects). Only the female plant produces fruit. The wild grapevine grows today through the temperate Mediterranean basin, as well as in parts of western and central Asia. Sometime during the Neolithic Period, the wild Eurasian grapevine was eventually developed as our domesticated type. The domestic vine's advantages over the wild type can be traced to its hermaphrodism (bisexual flowers occur together in the same plant, enabling self-pollination by the wind and fruit production by every flower). The genetic "history" encoded in the DNA of modern wild and domesticated grapes, together with that of any available samples, suggests an alternative means to track the development of viniculture in the Old World. |