On the road to the Médoc castles, stands the eccentric and imposing Cos d’Estournel winery, recognizable among thousands with the three astonishing Asian pagodas that top it. The owner of the house, the affable Michel Reybier, 78 years old, likes to entertain in the chartreuse of the property, a beautiful residence that one would swear is contemporary with the creation of the estate (1811). The host enjoys the surprise he arouses by revealing that he built it… ten years ago!
A jewel of 1,450 square meters
The illusion is perfect. From the door handles to the collection of porcelain that sits in one of the living rooms, the businessman has paid attention to the smallest detail, as with each of his projects. The spirit of Louis-Gaspard d’Estournel floats in every room of this 1,450 square meter jewel. Asked to magnify it, interior designer Jacques Garcia went to Jaipur to draw inspiration and hunt around. The dizziness of India seized him, as it seized the founder of this second growth of Saint-Estèphe two centuries earlier. “A visionary,” enthuses the current owner. Imagine: this nonconformist built a palace for his wine, which he shipped from the 1830s to Calcutta, Bombay and Madras.” The “Maharajah of Saint-Estèphe” wanted to make the greatest wine in the world. Michel Reybier follows in his footsteps without forcing himself. Excellence is for him a permanent quest.
His career attests to this. This son of a charcutier started out, at the age of 21, by successfully taking over a string of food businesses in difficulty in Lyon, before making his fortune by building an agri-food giant (Aoste, Justin Bridou, Cochonou, etc.).
The sole survivor of a plane crash, the self-made man then sold his group to the American conglomerate Sara Lee. At 50, the busy entrepreneur now takes (a little) his time and invests his money, his intuition and his energy in the art of living and health: “I want to be useful. The general interest is at the center of my actions.”
A simple objective: produce the best grapes
He quickly built up an empire in prestigious hotels, clinics and wineries. But the former Alpine hunter always keeps an eye on the peaks. As rigorous as he is passionate, he has boundless ambition for Cos d’Estournel. As soon as the property was purchased in 2000, its first objective was to produce the best grapes. Four years of “radiography” of the vineyard, step by step, made it possible to delimit 100 plots and 20 types of soil. Hence a colossal second project to set up a suitable winemaking tool.
In 2008, Michel Reybier offered his wine the first entirely gravity-fed, single-plot cellar, fitted out by Jean-Michel Wilmotte. “We just want to make the terroir speak, to offer a digestible wine, not too concentrated,” confides Michel Reybier. But we have only gone half the way. And when it comes to naturalness and biodiversity, we are never finished! “