Domaine de l'Enclos

Domaine de l'Enclos is the winery of brothers Romain and Damien Bouchard in Chablis. Juo from a young age - Romain since 2000 and Damien since 2010 - the brothers worked to help their father in his winery, and in 2005, after purchasing the 3.38-hectare Domaine de la Grande Chaume, Romain began producing his own certified organic wines in a small corner of his father's large and modern winery. 10 years later, Pascal Bouchard decided to sell his business to Albert Bichot, so the boys had to take a two-year break from winemaking due to lack of space. However, the family's vineyards covering an area of 25 hectares were passed on from the father to the sons, who at the same time began the conversion of the vineyards to organic production. When a unique opportunity presented itself, the brothers bought the former home of the monks of the historic Pontigny monastery in the center of Chablis and began to build there the cellar of their own dreams. The space got its name from the wall surrounding it, 'clos'. The 2016 vintage was the first to be produced in the new premises.

Now the farm's 29 hectares are looked after by a 12-person team all year round, and operations are carried out both by hand and by mechanical methods. In the nurseries, only organic fertilizers are used and the natural vegetation is allowed to flourish between the rows of vines. The average age of the vines is about 30 years, although the oldest vines were planted in the 1950s and 1970s. All of the farm's Premier and Grand Cru orchards are picked by hand, but harvesting machines are also used on some plots of the Chablis and Petit Chablis appellations, as there is only 10-12 days to harvest. The farm still has a 5-year contract with Albert Bichot, so part of the juice produced by the grapes is sold on. In addition to customer work, Romain mainly works in nurseries and is happiest working with his vines. Damien is mainly responsible for cellars and orders.

The wine cellar combines the principles of traditional winemaking with advanced, modern energy-saving methods. Gravity is used to move the wine and the temperature is controlled with heat pumps and efficient cement insulation. Wines are never chaptalized and both alcoholic and malolactic fermentation take place with the help of natural yeasts and bacterial strains. The wines are allowed to mature for a long time on the lees both in steel tanks and in French oak barrels of different ages. Sulfur dioxide is added extremely moderately only during bottling. The wines are not clarified or cold-stabilized, but only lightly filtered.

In 2016 and 2017, with low yields, plagued by mold diseases, frost and hailstorms, the farm produced only 30,000 and 40,000 bottles per year, but in 2018, they reached a production volume of more than 120,000 bottles. In 2018, the average yield of the paddocks reached up to 60hl/ha, while in 2019 it was again only around 40hl/ha.

https://www.domainedelenclos.fr/