Domaine Mélaric

WINEMAKERS

Melanie Hunin and Aymeric Hillaire

TYPE OF AGRICULTURE

Organic

VINEYARD AREA

4.5 ha

COUNTRY, REGION, SUBREGION

France, Loire, Saumur Puy-Notre-Dame

Melanie, from Paris, and Aymeric, from Saumur, are first generation winemakers; they met while studying at the Agronomic School of Montpellier. In 2006, they established Domaine Melaric (a weaving of their names) at the Chateau de Baugé, near the village of Puy-Notre-Dame. Their first two vintages were from rented vineyards and some additional purchased grapes. In 2008, they purchased four hectares of vineyards in Saumur Puy-Notre-Dame with advice from Philippe Gourdon (Château Tour Grise).

The vineyards of Saumur Puy-Notre-Dame are in an extension of the Layon Valley, and the chalk hills provide the shallow soils, good drainage and exposure required by late ripening varieties like Chenin. This area marks the transition from the sedimentary rocks of the Paris basin (limestone Saumur) and the metamorphic of the Armorican Basin (Anjou schist).

The weather systems coming in off the Atlantic are forced upwards by the Mauges hills to the West of Anjou. This causes a rain shadow which gives Saumur more of a continental climate. Le-Puy – being practically the most southerly point – averages less than 200mm/year. The elongated growing season this allows enables the wines to achieve ripeness.

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Wines