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The history of Chateau Latour

Chateau Latour is a French national treasure winery located on a relatively high gravel river bank in the south of the village of Pauillac in Bordeaux. The winery has 107.5 acres of vineyards and the average age of the plants is 35 years. The estate grows about 10,000 grapes per hectare and produces about 20,000 cases of wine annually.

Château Latour is also one of the first wineries to be classified in the 1855 classification system.

There are documented records of Château Latour dating back to 1331 AD. On October 18, 1331, Pons, lord of Castillon, approved the construction of a fort in Saint-Lambert by the Gaucelme de Castillon, an extremely wealthy family in the Medoc region at the time . In the mid-15th century, a watchtower was built here for the defense of the estuary, known as the “Saint-Maubert Tower“, located approximately 300 meters from the banks of the Gironde, a building with at least 2-story square watchtower.

The original wine and second wine of Château Latour are based on the former tower of Saint-Maubert and the architecture of the fortress at that time, respectively. Now the building known as the Tower of Saint-Maubert no longer exists, the circular white stone tower standing in the Chateau Latour was originally a pigeon house, built between 1620 and 1630. Since then, this white stone tower, the landmark building of Chateau Latour, has witnessed the vicissitudes of the Chateau for more than 300 years.

La Tour was established as a vineyard around the 16th century. In 1670, de Chavannes, private secretary to King Louis XIV of France, bought the vineyard. In 1677, due to marriage, the winery became the property of the de Clausel family. In 1695, Marie-Therese, the daughter of the de Clausel family, married Alexandre de Segur, the Marquis of Segur, and Latour was in the hands of the Segur family from then on. Nearly 300 years. At that time, the Xigang family was a famous family in the Bordeaux region.

At that time, it owned several famous wineries such as Lafite, Latour, Mouton and Calon-Segur. Nicholas, the son of Marquis Alexander, is also known as the “Prince of Wine”.

In 1755, the famous “Prince of Wine” passed away, but since then, the fate of Chateau Latour has been completely changed. Because before that, Nicola’s main focus was on another famous manor, Lafayette Winery. After the death of the marquis, Latour was transferred to the three wives and sisters of the son of the marquis due to inheritance, and officially separated from Lafayette. Although the property rights of the winery are divided, a considerable part of it is in the hands of the descendants of the Xigang family.

Chateau Latour was already a very famous winery in the 18th century. At that time, many nobles and wealthy families were keen on the famous wines of several famous wineries in Bordeaux. Chateau Latour was one of them. The name of Chateau Latour was among the four favorite Bordeaux chateaus of US President Thomas Jefferson during his tenure as ambassador to France. In 1855, Bordeaux graded the winery, and Château Latour was ranked among the top first-class wineries (Premier Grand Cru Classe).

In the middle of the 19th century, due to the geographical advantage of Bordeaux’s proximity to the Gironde waterway, the wine trade developed rapidly here, and promoted European consumers to increasingly prefer Bordeaux’s fine wines. At this time, the price of a bottle of Latour can be as high as 20 times that of other ordinary Bordeaux wines, entering the golden age of the winery.

In 1963, the Sigang family sold a 75% stake in Chateau Latour to two British companies, Harveys of Bristol and Pearson Group. When the news came, the whole country was in an uproar, thinking it was a traitorous act. Later, Harvey was acquired by Allied Lyons Group, which in March 1989 spent nearly 200 million US dollars to buy the shares of Chateau Latour in the hands of Pearson Group. In 1993, Union Lyon sold all the shares of Chateau Latour to Francois Pinault, the owner of the French retail giant Printemps. Chateau Latour finally disappeared in the hands of the British. After 30 years, it was returned to the French.

Fortunately, when the British held the equity of Latour, they did not interfere too much with the winery and completely delegated it to the famous winemaker at the time, Jean-Paul Gardere. Mr. Gardel lived up to expectations, and at the beginning of his tenure, he carried out drastic reforms to the winery. In 1963, Chateau Latour acquired two vineyards with a total of 12.5 hectares around the estate and began to eradicate the over-aging plants. In 1968 he began to work on improving the drainage system under the vineyard, and appropriate mechanization in vineyard management. The most important reform was in 1964, when Mr. Gardel defied all opposition and took the lead in replacing the old wooden fermentation tanks with temperature-controlled stainless steel fermentation tanks in the top wineries of Medoc. The capital injection and meritocracy of the winery by British shareholders enabled Chateau Latour to quickly escape the influence of World War II and enter another golden age.