Vine management
We tend the vines according to simple, age-old principles. The estate’s team also adapts their wine-making practices to take account of the latest technical innovations and our growing understanding of the science of wine-making. This helps them to work in a way that is best for the terroir and the preservation of its distinctive characteristics and best for both the local environment and the long-term future of the vineyard.
We do not use herbicides on the vines, and the soil is worked in an environmentally-sensitive way. This enables the soil to provide the vine with the right kind of nutrition at the right time, in just the right quantity for vines that are designed to produce large grapes. We use a supervised control approach to pests and all work on the vines is carefully planned with a view to maximizing effectiveness and limiting environmental impact. This effects how we spray the vines and when we perform different operations, with the weather being a factor we take into consideration when attempting to reduce the impact we have on the environment to a minimum.
Wine-making
Our main aim as we make and age Château Georges wines is to bring out the very best in the grapes we bring to the storehouse. The grapes are harvested at optimal ripeness (they are tasted as they ripen to determine when this moment is) and transported to the vats with the utmost of care. Grapes from different plots of land are separated and vinified in temperature-controlled stainless steel and concrete vats. Traditional extraction techniques, (pumping over, punching down the cap, rack and return), are employed, being tailored to individual plots of vines and vintages. The wine is aged in new and used barrels (previously used for 1 wine only) in order to demonstrate the true potential of young wine and to turn it into a great wine.
