Louis Boillot et Fils

Growing Area
Côte de Beaune, Côte de Nuits, Beaujolais

Proprietor
Louis Boillot & Clément Boillot

Year Founded
2003

Size
11 hectares

Farming Practice
Organic

Family Matters

After bringing two esteemed heritages under one roof, Louis Boillot and Ghislaine Barthold have nurtured the only thing more important than old vines on esteemed terroir: a son who’s every bit as visionary as they’ve been.

For the scion of two families whose unified holdings in Burgundy comprise one of the most envied portfolios in the Cote-d’Or, Clément Boillot told us to meet him at a surprising place: the 16th-century windmill that marks one’s arrival in Moulin-à-Vent. It’s an iconic landmark, no doubt. But the standard-bearer of an estate whose vineyards range from Volnay and Pommard up through Chambolle-Musigny and Gevrey-Chambertin wanted to show off … four hectares in Beaujolais?

That’s right. And truth be told, we weren’t really surprised. The cool and collected torchbearer of two blueblood Burgundian domaines—six feet and five inches of quiet confidence and intense listening power—shares his parents’ exquisite instinct for old vines in overachieving terroir, and that’s what they identified here in the early 2010s. Louis Boillot et Fils’ 11 parcels in Moulin-à-Vent and Fleurie are reminiscent of their vaunted plots an hour-and-a-half to the north: vines pushing 70 and 80 years old deeply rooted in a wide spectrum of granitic soils (which of course present different possibilities than the limestone, marl, and stony clay they farm in the Cote-d’Or—where some vines predate the First World War).

The first thing to know about Louis Boillot et Fils is that its own roots reach back way further than the domaine’s emergence in 2002. That’s when Louis took over half his father Lucien’s estate, which had been split between him and his brother Pierre. But rather than just coast on his patrimony—prime sites in Volnay and Gevrey patiently assembled by four generations of his forebears—Louis left the family operation soon thereafter to combine forces with his wife Ghislaine Barthod, a brilliant vigneron who added still more old vines to the mix, from her family’s heritage in Chambolle-Musigny. Louis took over viticulture—the meticulous pruner is renowned as a vine whisperer—and they built a deep, cold cave in Chambolle where they could make wine side-by-side.

That’s the legacy—and prowess—their son Clément is now building on. He has taken up his parents’ quest for purity and transparency, and charged it with an open-minded dynamism that marks Boillot’s old-school Pinots no less than their new-school Gamays.

It would take a short book to do justice to the astonishing array of wines being patiently crafted in that chilly Chambolle cellar. There are more than two dozen Burgundy cuvées, of which 16 are Premier Cru—and many of those frequently rival Grand Cru bottlings that hail from neighboring plots. The Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Cherbaudes, for instance, comes from a .17-hectare parcel planted 100 years ago just below Mazis-Chambertin Grand Cru. By a similar token, Boillot’s village-level Gevrey-Chambertin Les Evocelles comes from a sheer, stony limestone slope on a hill bordering two 1er Cru vineyards, Les Goulots and Les Champeaux—a cold site whose wines show an impressively firm minerality. Over and over, this is the Boillot family’s pattern: incredible parcels just meters away from even more famous (and prohibitively expensive) ones, filled with ancient vines that frequently outshine those gold-plated neighbors.

The house style has long achieved sensuality through nuance, subtlety, and precision, and Clément has carried that forward by means of gentle extractions even when maceration times are long. He emphasizes freshness and is willing to experiment in pursuit of it. Thus even with the benefit of decades of winemaking experience and protocols laid out by his parents, he’s willing to adapt, as with the introduction of partial stainless steel maturation in everything up to village-level reds. That attitude is partly down to youthful dynamism, and partly to the tremendous support structure his parents have bequeathed him.

But Clément is no more content to rest on his laurels than his parents were—as his ambitions in Beaujolais attest. Vinifying their Gamay grapes à la Bourguignonne, with only limited inclusion of whole clusters, Boillot et Fils is crafting Beaujolais cuvées whose aromatic complexities spring forth from tightly coiled structures. These wines do need a little bit of time to unwind—but like their northern and more glamorous cousins, Les Moulins possess serious aging potential. One of their most striking sites, which is among the coolest in the appellation, is the steep hillside of Champ de Cour. Its echalas-trained vines stand upright on decomposed granite and produce a smoky, high-toned, and complex nose redolent of savory spice and dark berries. This mid-weight, racy Moulin-à-Vent continues to unfold in the glass and finishes a mile long. It’s an amazing wine. But then so is Les Roucheaux, from whose 70-year-old vines in pink sand over blue granite the Boillots coax an evocation of brambly fruit flecked with cocoa and wisps of a sweet-smelling bonfire; and the dense, crunchy Les Brussellions; and the classy, finely polished tannins of Aux Caves. With all the energy and excitement going on here, it’s no wonder at all that Clément picked Moulin-à-Vent’s namesake windmill as our starting point.

Just the same, there’s no losing the significance that Chambolle holds for Louis Boillot et Fils—both as the site of vinification and the family’s spiritual center. And we won’t soon forget the startling sight we witnessed there after driving back up from Moulin-à-Vent.

Rolling into the village for a late lunch with Clément, we couldn’t help noticing a quite unexpected addition to Chambolle’s quintessential paysan chic: a freshly road-killed pigeon lying in the middle of the street. Were we the first witnesses? What were we supposed to do? We were gloveless outsiders armed with nothing more than the address of a charming restaurant. It would hardly do to greet the maître d’ bearing avian remains. So we hurried through the door, only to find ourselves the only ones inside. The owner guided us to a table, but after a few minutes it felt funny to just sit inside waiting. So we strolled back out—just in time to see Clément heading up the street in our direction. In one swift motion, as smoothly as if it had been choreographed, he stooped down in mid-stride, bare-handed the bird carcass, and yelled to a passing neighbor with a smile, “Qui veut du pigeon à midi?!”

A strangely amusing spectacle, to be sure—and one that teed up some belly laughs over lunch after Clément disposed of the unlucky bird. Yet it also seemed to encapsulate something indispensable about the way Clément is taking up the reins to advance and extend the legacy his parents have created here: with fearless confidence, no trace of pretension, and entirely in stride.

wines

Red

Varietal/Blend
Gamay

Vineyard Area
From middle-aged vines in an amphitheater-shaped lieu

Soil
Sandy, poor topsoils over red-pink granite

Elevation
980 feet

Exposure
South

Vinification
Manually harvested with some whole-cluster inclusion (15% maximum) in the fermentation, pump-overs during maceration (avoiding too many punch-downs) before completing fermentation after about three weeks.

Maturation
Up to 12 months in 500-liter and 228-liter barrels with a small portion in new oak

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Red

Varietal/Blend
Gamay

Vineyard Area
From only the old vines of several of the estate’s lieux-dits (vineyard selection changes depending on the vintage)

Soil
Sandy and granitic

Elevation
650-950 feet

Exposure
Southeast

Vinification
Manually harvested with some whole-cluster inclusion (15% maximum) in the fermentation, pump-overs during a three-week maceration period (avoiding too many punch-downs)

Maturation
Up to 12 months in a combination of stainless and lightly used 500- and 228-liter barrels with a small portion of new oak

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Red

Varietal/Blend
Gamay

Vineyard Area
From 70-year-old vines on the western border of the appellation

Soil
Sand and silt over granite

Elevation
920 feet

Exposure
Southeast

Vinification
Manually harvested with some whole-cluster inclusion (15% maximum) in the fermentation, pump-overs during a three-week maceration period (avoiding too many punch-downs)

Maturation
Up to 12 months in lightly used 500 and 228-liters barrels with a small portion of new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Gamay

Vineyard Area
On the western limit of the appellation below Le Moulin à Vent

Soil
Granitic sand with quartz over deep granite bedrock

Elevation
820 feet

Exposure
Southeast

Vinification
Manually harvested with some whole-cluster inclusion (15% maximum) in the fermentation, pump-overs during a three-week maceration period (avoiding too many punch-downs)

Maturation
Up to 12 months in lightly used 500 and 228-liters barrels with a small portion of new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Gamay

Vineyard Area
From 70-year-old vines in La Rochelle which is on the northwestern end Moulin-à-Vent just above Aux Caves

Soil
Sandy topsoils consisting of decomposed granite over deep granite

Elevation
South

Exposure
925 feet

Vinification
Manually harvested with some whole-cluster inclusion (15% maximum) in the fermentation, pump-overs during a three-week maceration period (avoiding too many punch-downs)

Maturation
Up to 12 months in lightly used 500 and 228-liters barrels with a small portion of new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Gamay

Vineyard Area
From a foothill on the eastern side of the appellation

Soil
Alluvial, silty soils consisting of pebbles and grey and white sand

Elevation
670 feet

Exposure
Southeast

Vinification
Manually harvested with some whole-cluster inclusion (15% maximum) in the fermentation, pump-overs during a three-week maceration period (avoiding too many punch-downs)

Maturation
Up to 12 months in lightly used 500 and 228-liters barrels with a small portion of new oak

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Red

Varietal/Blend
Gamay

Vineyard Area
From a 1.2-hectare parcel of 70-year-old vines in the lieu of Les Roucheaux in the village of Romanèche-Thorins

Soil
Pink sand over blue granite

Elevation
730 feet

Exposure
Southeast

Vinification
Manually harvested with some whole-cluster inclusion (15% maximum) in the fermentation, pump-overs during a three-week maceration period (avoiding too many punch-downs)

Maturation
Up to 12 months in lightly used 500 and 228-liters barrels with a small portion of new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Gamay

Vineyard Area
From old vines in Plantier de Favre which is in middle of Moulin-à-Vent

Soil
Sandy topsoils over granite of varying depths

Elevation
750 feet

Exposure
Southeast

Vinification
Manually harvested with some whole-cluster inclusion (15% maximum), pump-overs during a three-week maceration period (avoiding too many punch-downs)

Maturation
Up to 12 months in lightly used 500 and 228-liters barrels with a small portion of new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From old vines in Gevrey-Chambertin and Brochon

Soil
Clay-limestone

Vinification
Manually harvested and destemmed before a cold soak of several days. Pump-overs and punch-downs during maceration. After about three weeks, the wine is moved to barrels where malolactic fermentation occurs.

Maturation
12 months in a combination of barrel (two-thirds) and stainless (one-third). Barrels are then racked to stainless steel and the wine spends its last 6 months there until bottling (without fining or filtration).

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Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From mid-slope vines in Brochon lieu of "Vignois"

Soil
Shallow limestone-based clay soils

Exposure
Southeast

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Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From .11 hectare of vines mostly from the village level portion of Beaux Bruns and the remainder from Derrière le Four and Les Chardannes — vines were planted in the 1980s.

Soil
Deep clay-limestone soils

Exposure
South-East

Vinification
Manually harvested and destemmed before a cold soak of several days. Pump-overs and punch-downs during maceration. After about three weeks, once fermentation is complete, the wine is moved to barrels where malolactic fermentation occurs. The wine is racked once after malolactic and again before it is bottled without fining or filtration.

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From 85-year-old vines in the lieu-dit of Les Herbues near the middle of Fixin

Soil
Limestone and marl mixtures

Maturation
Up to 12 months in barrels and up to 10% new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From old vines in eight different lieux-dits totaling 1.8 hectares. They are Le Fourneau, Jouise, Creux Brouillard, Croix des Champs, Es Murrots, Les Crais, Combe du Lavaut, Les Lavaux, Clos Prieurs-Bas and Vignes Belles.

Soil
Clay-limestone mixtures

Elevation
250-300 meters

Exposure
East-Southeast

Vinification
Manual harvest and destemmed before a cold soak of several days. Pump-overs and punch-downs during maceration. After about three weeks, the wine is moved to barrels where malolactic fermentation occurs.

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
Evocelles is a steep vineyard on Gevrey’s north-easternmost limit at the top of the hill, neighboring 1er Cru Les Goulots, 1er Cru Les Champeaux and 1er Cru Combe aux Moines. Most of Boillot's holding is situated on the side of Brochon with a smaller portion on the side of Gevrey.

Soil
Clay-limestone and full of stones (same terroir as neighboring 1er Crus)

Elevation
350 feet

Exposure
East

Maturation
Up to 12 months in barrels and up to 20% new oak

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Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From a .19 ha parcel of 45+-year old vines in Les Champonenets

Soil
Stony clay soils of medium density

Elevation
290 meters

Exposure
Northeast

Maturation
Up to 12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From a .17-hectare parcel in Cherbaudes planted over 100 years ago with some replacements — it sits just below Mazis-Chambertin Grand Cru.

Soil
Stony red clay

Elevation
270 meters

Exposure
Southeast

Maturation
12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From a .27-hectare parcel in Les Prûliers just south of the village of Nuits-St.-Georges — vines were planted in 1911.

Soil
Hard limestone rock on clay soil

Elevation
260 meters

Exposure
East

Maturation
12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From a small parcel in the village portion of Beaune Les Épenottes (at the border of Pommard) — vines were planted in 1946

Soil
Clay-limestone marl

Exposure
Southeast

Maturation
12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From a .17-hectare parcel in Les Croix Noires on the southern end of Pommard bordering Volnay (the smallest 1er Cru of the appellation) — vines were planted in 1928.

Soil
Deep and rich clay soils with brown limestone rock

Exposure
East

Maturation
12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From a .29-hectare parcel in Les Frémiers on the southern end Pommard at the border of Volnay — vines were planted in 1967.

Soil
Deep clay soils with large limestone rocks all over

Exposure
Southeast

Maturation
12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From 70-year-old vines in Les Grand Poisots bordering Pommard

Soil
Fine clay with limestone

Exposure
Southeast

Maturation
12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From a .54-hectare site is Les Angles, situated just east of Volnay — vines are mostly 45 years old with a small portion of 85-year old vines.

Soil
Brown clay-limestone

Elevation
250 to 300 meters

Exposure
Southeast

Maturation
12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak

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Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From a .18-hectare parcel in Les Brouillards which is a gently sloped site on the border of Pommard to the northeast of Volnay (50 meters from Les Angles)— vines were planted in 1984.

Soil
Densely packed clay soils with fractured limestone rock piercing the surface

Exposure
East

Maturation
12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak

Red

Varietal/Blend
Pinot Noir

Vineyard Area
From .18-hectare parcel in Les Caillerets of 45-year-old vines — it's a gently sloping site on the southern end of Volnay

Soil
Densely packed, red-brown clay consisting of limestone rocks and stones of various sizes that pierce the surface

Elevation
275 meters

Exposure
East

Maturation
12 months in barrels and up to 30% new oak