Les Vercots
21420 Aloxe-Corton

Owner / wine maker: Franck Follin-Arbelet

Background

Aloxe-Corton is often overlooked when the great villages of Burgundy are enumerated. Gevrey, Nuits, Meursault.... all spring instantly to mind and Aloxe always somehow seems to be tagging along behind. It may be home to only 190 inhabitants (despite boasting 3 châteaux), but its 245ha makes it far from the smallest of the Côte d´Or appellations (it is bigger than both Vosne and Volnay). Even more surprising then when one discovers that it is here that is found the greatest concentration of Grand Cru vineyards in Burgundy, more than 100ha in total.

Lying at the base of the “mountain” of Corton (to which it adjoined its name in 1862), the village produces almost exclusively red wine (99% to be precise). There is nothing mediocre however about its white wine, the grandiosely named Corton Charlemagne. Legend has it that the Emperor was a great fan of the wines of Corton, however on staining his beard one day with its illustrious reds he ordered in a fit of pique that part of the hill should be replanted with white wine. Apocryphal undoubtedly, as the red / white divide can be explained geologically, but a good yarn nonetheless. It is also said that Voltaire drank nothing else, but always in private, reserving the lesser wines of the Beaujolais for his guests.

Aloxe is home to 8 vignerons, amongst them the young and mild-mannered Franck Follin-Arbelet. Franck does not come from a long line of winemakers. His father being an army man, he was born in Morocco. He studied geology and geophysics before coming to wine through his wife´s family. His father-in-law, André Masson, a former director of the Hospices de Beaune, was a descendant of the Arbelet family, who had been land owners in Aloxe since the 19th century, although the vines were historically rented out.

From 1990 Franck worked for the first 4 or 5 years as an employee at the estate, learning the trade. Slowly during the ´90s the rented out land came back under the control of the family, so that today Franck, who now runs the estate, farms around six and a half hectares, situated in some of the prestigious sites of the appellation.

Like many of his generation he has gone over to la lutte raisonnée. He works closely with the Chamber of Agriculture to assess as and when treatments are necessary. He is also conscious of treating at the appropriate time of day to ensure maximum effectiveness. Working the soil mechanically is preferred to the use of weedkillers, although there is some grass cover on the steepest slopes to prevent erosion. The vines are pruned short and are de-budded systematically, sometimes twice, to ensure low yields and the correct spacing of the bunches. Such rigorous treatment means that green-harvesting is only necessary in the youngest and most vigorous vines.

The work in the cellar is based on minimum intervention, the goal being to ensure a gradual vinification which allows each terroir to show through. He is not in favour of the universally fashionable maceration à froid, preferring to control the temperature of the fermenting must to guarantee a more progressive fermentation, although with naturally cool cellars, this is hardly a concern (in some vintages the fermentation can last up to a year!).

Franck is not an obviously mystical character, but in one corner of the elegant vaulted cellars stands a tall, elegant stone, a menhir to be precise. It appears that a local “witch” discovered a confluence of telluric currents, more commonly known as ley lines, in the this part of the building, and the stone marks the spot. Quite what influence this fact has on the wines is impossible to say but on the plant life it is another matter. A close inspection of the photo below reveals a branch of ivy wrapped around the stone and apparently thriving. A curiosity in a cellar which spends 90% of its time in total darkness....

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Vineyard Holdings

Commune	level*	lieu dit /Climat		wines made	Area (ha)	Vine age	Status*
Pernand Vergelesses	PC	Les Fichots		R	0.50	21-30	SC
	PC	En Caradeux		R	0.37	34	SC
Aloxe Corton	V	Les Combes	]	R	0.75	46+	SC/O
	V	Boulmeau	]
	PC	Clos du Chapitre		R	1.00	15-36	SC/O
	PC	Les Vercots		R	1.00	15-56	SC/O
	GC	Le Corton		R	0.50	30	SC
	GC	Corton Bressandes		R	0.43	47	SC
	GC	Corton Charlemagne		W	0.57	50+	SC
Vosne Romanée	GC	Romanée Saint Vivant		R	0.49	32	SC
		Total Ha			5.61

Key

R/W= Red or White wines made in this lieu dit / climat
R	= Regional appellation	O	= Owner
V	= Village	SC	= Share cropper
PC	= Premier Cru	TF	= Tenant farmer
GC	= Grand Cru