2020 La Vigne du Clou

Alexandre Jouveaux is a former Chanel fashion photographer but left Paris in 1995 to become a winemaker in Mâcon. Here he worked as a teacher at the local wine school, while slowly acquiring enough plots to start his own domaine. Since he is a major opponent of bureaucracy, all wines are classified as Vin de France, even though their quality is so much higher than that.

Alexandre works with a principle of minimal intervention and harvests by hand, just as he works organically in the vineyard (he is not certified, however). In the cellar, the grapes are poured into a hydraulic press, after which the must is put in 1200 litre wooden barrels (foudre) without being fined or filtered. The annual production is only of about 6,000 bottles, so you have to be quick to grab a bottle if you get the chance.

The wines can be a bit reductive when they are young but have great ageing potential thanks to their limestone acidity and intense minerality. Alexandre Jouveaux makes vibrant wine that is tremendously pure, fresh and acidic while expressing both Chardonnay and the terroir of Mâcon in a very honest way.