Saint-Estèphe, a singular terroir

The vines of the Médoc flourish on a narrow stretch of land seven kilometers wide that unfurls seventy kilometers from north to south along the Gironde Estuary. And it is in the Médoc’s northernmost communal appellation that the gentle slopes of Saint-Estèphe compose a magnificent tableau.
The lion’s share of the appellation’s terroir is composed of the same gravelly soils that are predominant throughout the left bank of the Gironde, but there is also a good amount of clay and an even more significant portion of limestone basement rock at the surface that bring the estate’s Merlot to a deeper, more complex form of expression.

These diverse, complex soils form a series of knolls in the immediate vicinity of the estuary. The Gironde is much wider in Saint-Estèphe, and the influence of its briny winds and its ability to temper extreme temperatures through water evaporation are felt even more strongly.

Esteys, the rivulets that run perpendicular to and flow into the Gironde, form as a result of the appellation’s sloped topography and perfectly illustrate its formidable capacity to drain accumulated rainwater.
The resulting marshes, or jalles, are ecosystems in and of themselves that provide freshness that is crucial to nearby vineyards.

Highly singular indeed, the terroir of Cos is a true paradigm: located at the edge of a plateau on a hill of deep gravel, clay and limestone soils at the edge of the Gironde Estuary and the Breuil Jalle that feeds into it, the vineyard of Cos d’Estournel is situated upon a site that is the perfect representation of Saint-Estèphe’s terroir.
It is here that Louis-Gaspard d’Estournel, convinced that the ideal location of his estate would allow him to craft exceptional wines, pursued his life’s masterpiece, and where Michel Reybier in 2000 was driven by the conviction that it could be “Cos, and only Cos.”