In 2007, eager to ensure the continuing success of the estate in the same philosophy - with a focus on impeccable land stewardship - May Eliane de Lencquesaing sold the property to the Rouzaud family, owners and descendants of Louis Roederer. The château's seminal 1982 vintage even garnered the perfect score of 100 points by wine critic Robert Parker. The consistent quality, year after year, was simply indisputable. It was under her ownership that Pichon Comtesse’s reputation as a prized Pauillac wine flourished and earned its “super second” reputation (referring to its Second Growth classification). May Eliane de Lencquesaing, Edouard’s daughter, inherited it in 1978 and ran it until 2007. At the time of Baron Joseph de Pichon Longueville’s death in 1850, his estate was split between his two children: his daughter Virginie who married the Comte de Lalande (Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande) and his son Raoul who inherited the title of Baron (Château Pichon Longueville Baron).Įdouard and Louis Miailhe, descendants of an old Bordeaux family of vineyard owners and wine brokers, purchased Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande in 1925. Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande and Pichon Longueville Baron were once one large property. Under the 1855 Classification, which Napoleon III requested for the Exposition Universelle de Paris, Pichon-Lalande falls under the Deuxièmes Grands Crus Classés, or Second Classified Growth category.
The results speak for themselves: Pichon Longueville is now quintessential top-notch Paulliac muscular, powerful, and concentrated wine of real ‘breeding.’ It is also very much a wine built to last there is never any rush to drink Pichon from a good vintage and great years seem to last for many decades – truly, a fitting icon for the fine work.Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande is located on Bordeaux’s Left Bank, in the world-renowned Pauillac appellation. But most importantly, a massive investment was made into understanding the Longueville terroir, its best vineyard plots, in addition to modern winemaking techniques and only the finest French oak. They commissioned the creation of the existing modern winery, designed by Patrick Dillon and Jean de Gastines. Motivated by their desire to return Pichon to its former glory, they purchased new vineyards in superior sites. The company director, Jean-Michel Cazes, and his winemaker friend Daniel Llose, soon began an incredible program of improvements and restoration to this historical Château. The property’s return to splendor occurred in the late 1980s when the family sold Longueville to the AXA Millsimes insurance firm. The wine quality slipped, and loyal customers slowly turned away. Bertrand Boutellier, who inherited the property from his father Jean, showed little enthusiasm for producing fine Bordeaux, nor was he disposed to making an essential investment into the Châteaux. Thereafter the fortunes of Longueville would slide when it was sold to the Boutellier family in 1933.
However, following its owner’s death, Joseph de Pichon-Longueville, and subsequently his son, Raoul, the estate was divided into two. Before the 1860s, the estate was joined with its twin property Pichon-Lalande, having been founded by the same family. Today, the wines of this renowned estate are justly celebrated. For Pichon-Longueville – renamed from Pichon Baron – has enjoyed a remarkable history in Bordeaux, and like so many of its neighbors, has lived through prosperous and more challenging times. Dominating the region with its architecturally splendid fairy tale Château, Pichon-Longueville’s star talking point is the bold, baroque winery, which is floodlit at night, giving first-time visitors to the area a wonderful sense of the estate’s theatricality and importance. The wines are powerful, virile, structured, and long-lived. There is a great aromatic presence of fresh red fruit, Morello cherry and blackcurrant. Beautiful Deuxième Cru (Second Growth) Château Pichon-Longueville, in the Pauillac wine region is quite simply one of Bordeaux’s finest estates and the poster child for superlative claret. Chteau Pichon Baron 2012 offers an intense, almost opaque garnet colour.