France Provence Bandol
In the hilly Bandol area near Saint-Anne d'Evenos in Provence lies Château Sainte Anne – a historic family estate that has shaped the character of the region for five generations. Today, the estate is run by Françoise Dutheil and her son Jean-Baptiste Dutheil, who follow the old traditions of organic and partly biodynamic winemaking dating back to the 1960s – one of the original members of the Association des Vins Naturels in the early 1980s.
The fields are located on steep, limestone and sandy terraces, just a few kilometers from the Mediterranean. The micro-limestone from the sea breeze and cool nights create ideal conditions for Mourvèdre, Grenache, Cinsault, Clairette and Ugni Blanc on their 15 ha domaine. The vines are often older – 35–85 year old goblet-cropped plants – and are grown with minimal tillage and hand harvesting.
The vinification is natural and elegant: grapes are harvested manually and fermented without temperature logs or unnecessary additives. Red wines are fermented with wild yeast in stainless steel tanks, while they are aged in large, neutral oak foudres for 20–22 months before bottling. The rosé wines are made half saignée, half free-flowing – all wines are bottled without fining and with minimal sulfites (~2–35 mg/l).
