Our Philosophy
Biodynamics
The estate has been converting to organic agriculture since 2006 and has been practicing biodynamics since 2012. We have been Biodyvin certified since 2017.
This approach allows us to work in harmony with natural cycles and preserve soil life, essential to the expression of our terroirs.
Ancestral gestures
Generation after generation, the gestures are repeated, precise, according to an implacable rhythm, reflecting this exceptional heritage that is the knowledge of our soils and vines and which allow us to produce the best fruits for our great Savennières cuvées.
These gestures are passed on to our workers as in all crafts of excellence.
"A gesture is a man or a woman, a know-how, a specific vocabulary."
Gestures in the vineyard
Pruning is the immutable gesture, the genesis of viticulture. Pruning a vine is taming a wild vine to, year after year, shape a framework: the vine stock.
The first challenge for the pruner is to choose a pruning system adapted to the grape variety and its terroir. This orientation is strong, it conditions the future of the vine for the next 50, 70, 100 years.
In Savennières, we traditionally use double Guyot pruning with short trellised wood. It allows good foliage exposure while ensuring consistent grape production.
Gestures in the cellar
Emphasis is placed on the quality of gestures performed by our workers at each stage of production, the heritage of a long wine-making tradition.
Cultivating biodiversity
LPO Excellence
The estate has been classified as a Wildlife Excellence Refuge by the Bird Protection League since 2008.
Recherche
An inventory of wild plants on the hillsides is underway, as well as research on mycorrhizae to refine our understanding and knowledge of soils.
Expérimentation
An experimental plot has been planted in the last three years with 4 different rootstocks for adaptation to water stress.
Innovation and transmission
The vine cycle repeats itself season after season, the gestures are invariably reproduced. Each vintage is a rediscovery, with its own character. We dig into our memories to find similarities with past years, to better understand the one to come.
Viticulture is a profession of daily adaptation but also of anticipation on a long time scale. Domaine du Closel relies jointly on scientific spirit, organic agriculture, and biodynamics to progress and preserve the Savennières landscape, research work that may perhaps see innovations become tradition.
However, it is sometimes good to slow down, not to limit oneself to one's experience to look back. Where we imagine novelty, precious knowledge had often already been shaped by ancestral empiricism.