In 2019, Pierre Amadieu Winery will celebrate 90 years of existence at the heart of Gigondas, its birthplace. This is the opportunity for our family to mark this anniversary date with a ‘tribute’ wine, and also to unveil new projects, such as the ageing cellar which will be completed in the early part of 2019.
In 1929, our grand-father Pierre Amadieu, then aged 19, took charge of the 7 hectares of vines in the small family vineyard in Gigondas. But Pierre was an entrepreneur at heart and was keen to produce his own wines. So, that very year, he decided to make, and then sell, his first wine which he gave his own name, and thus the story of the Pierre Amadieu Winery began.
For almost 40 years, he continued to develop the family vineyard and became a major player in the growing reputation of the appellation. He invested in buildings devoted to winemaking and ageing the wines. In the 1950s he purchased two hillside properties, Romane and La Machotte, which would later come to produce the House’s historic cuvee.
With the passing years, generations, and planting campaigns, the 7 hectares turned into 137 hectares, making the Pierre Amadieu Winery the largest private vineyard in Gigondas. Pierre tirelessly promoted the appellation and played a big part in obtaining its official recognition in 1971.
His two sons followed in his footsteps, as of 1965 for Jean-Pierre, who concentrated on the winemaking process, and 1975 for Claude, who preferred to tend to the vineyard. They launched a new wave of planting operations, and perfected the winemaking techniques and the sales angle. The activity of the Pierre Amadieu Winery continued to grow under the impetus of these two men, who proudly pursued the labour of love initiated by their father.
Today, with the arrival of the new generation, the stakes are to preserve and highlight this great heritage left by the man who passed on his name and his passion to his family. Pierre, accompanied by his uncle Claude, took up this challenge in the ‘90s and his cousins Henri-Claude, Jean-Marie, and Marie are progressively joining the ranks to look after the sales dimension, the winemaking aspect, and the wine tourism offer.
So, given the importance of the date, our united and passionate family wanted to pay tribute to Pierre, the founding father of the Winery.
The first tribute is to his talents as a builder, through the extension of the cellar next to the reception area. The extension has been built with natural stones and the cellar will be able to house 75 barrels, each with a capacity of 225 litres, as well as 21 big casks (called ‘foudres’) of 30 and 50 hectolitres. It improves the layout of the cellar space devoted to ageing the wines and gives more room to work on the wines with even greater precision and adapt the ageing process to each different wine.
We pay tribute to his foresightedness too, he who saw the exceptional potential of the terroir of the plots of Romane and La Machotte for the creation of great wines.
90 years after the first bottle signed ‘Pierre Amadieu’, it is the ‘Romane-Machotte’ cuvee which will sport a special anniversary look to celebrate the man he was. It will be available in the usual distribution channels: at the estate in Gigondas and in on-trade market, hotels, restaurants, and wine merchants. As of October 2018 it will be available with this 90th anniversary label, until 2020 when it will return to its classic look.
