From green to translucent, the veraison
When the berries become translucent, we call it the “veraison”. It usually allows to determine the harvest date, about 40 days later. End August/beginning september is the time of ripening process.
Hail, frost, the vine and the winegrower
Nature remains the boss and knows how come back as a reminder of anyone who would forget it. Obviously, the winegrowers don’t belong to this category. They daily work with it and have the memory of at least one painful event. Hail storms last year, unexpected frost on may this year, belong to theses bad memories. In fact, how protect […]
Winter weather in cognac vineyards
Since this first days or this new year, winter is there in cognac region, with its white mornings, frozen fields and vineyards, frozen grass glittering in sun like today, in short, a “temps de saison” as we say in french. And an opportunity to take photos and share them.
Distiller, full-time job in wintertime
He/she wakes up early morning, generally between 4 and 6, each day, during the distillation time. As for a single-handed round world race, he/she crosses non-stop several weeks or months depending from the quantity of vine to be distilled. Even if modern facilities such as computer controlled devices, and gaz heating allow to sleep at home and no more in […]
November in the heart of a golden autumn
November is the kick off month for distillation. After the harvest time, distillation is a magic moment as well. In the vineyards, last fireworks in golden and brown colors take place before winter, a great inspiration for pictures… and many business travels this month, visits in museum, so as a stroll in Pays Basque for week end, as we […]
October means harvest month in cognac
October month is very busy in cognacvineyards. Harvest time is on. Depending of the previous seasons, harvest begins early october or mid october, but always in this month. We felt really good as living a never-ended summer, and the morning mist gave the landscape a fairytale atmosphere…
Cognac harvest days, the crunch time
After a year of hard work, hoping that the weather conditions would be nice enough till the cognac harvest time, the single most important decision of the winegrower is to choose the right day to begin harvest. It looks like a very subtle balance betweeen professionnal skills and intuition, and requires a fair amount of experience. Needless to say that […]
September in cognac vineyards, the indian summer
As for many of us, september means “back to work”. Fortunately we live in a so lovely countryside in Charente, that with sunny and warm weather, it seemed to be still holidays time in cognac vineyards … A lot of nice things to do and to see, and first of all, the famous “circuit des remparts d’Angoulême”. A race in the town for classic and vintage cars, […]
From Miami to cognac vineyards
Let me tell you the true story of a sleeping beauty in cognac vineyards and of two princes of design, elegance, and creativity coming for Miami. For Pierre and Max, it has been love at first sight for this 15th century manor left to rot for a too long time. “In twenty years when […]
Musical july in cognac
After a grey and rainy june, rather unusal for the season, july came with sun and heat in its luggages. First musical moment of the summertime in the region, the Cognac Blues Passion Festival. International blues, rock-pop headliners came in Cognac, such as emerging young artists, playing in the starry night. Iggy Pop, Marianne Faithfull, The […]
