Pierre Lurton
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Trusted Instincts and Excellence
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If there is nobility in wine, and I believe that there is, then the blood of Château d’Yquem must be the deepest blue. When classifications were handed out in 1855 they were the only Sauternes to be given the title of Premier Cru Supérieur and the wine has maintained such high standards that to talk about the greatest ever wines and not to mention d’Yquem is akin to going outside without your trousers on, unless you wear a kilt of course.
It is a wine that is so complex, concentrated, and has the ability, if looked after, to reward one over a century later. This honey beauty is as balanced as the person walking over the Niagara Falls on a tightrope, and a satisfying is anything that Shakespeare has to offer.
There are so many reasons for this and chief among them must be the fact that the producers don't rush or treat the grapes with a lack of respect. There are no single sweeps of the vineyard here, and the people of Château d’Yquem know that it is sometimes better to pick individual grapes when they're ready than to rush things like a boy on his first date.
They sweep on average 6 times to pick the best expressions of ‘noble rot’ and have been known to abandon a vintage if the grapes are not deemed worthy of gracing a bottle.
To call d’Yquem a dessert wine is similar to cheapening something by using the word ‘nice’. This is winemaking as an art form, and Château d’Yquem must know what they're about because they've been in business since the sixteenth century. Is it any wonder that a bottle of the 2011 was sold for £75,000 to become the most expensive bottle of white wine sold at the moment?
To be allowed to have conversation with Pierre Lurton, the chief executive officer, can only be classed as having a conversation with viticultural royalty. He was appointed to the presidency of the company in 2004 and has steered Château d’Yquem gently through the seas of modernity while respecting that he's in charge of a brand that cannot be pushed hastily into the future. If you study his history, you will understand that he has the safe hands of a man whose family has become one of the great wine names of Bordeaux and beyond.
I start by asking him if the Lurton children are always expected to go into the family business?
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Pierre Lurton: Yes and no. I was lucky enough to gain experience on the slopes at Château Clos Fourtet for 10 years, and to take over the management of Château Cheval Blanc for 30 years outside the family system.
Winefullness: Château d'Yquem is a wine that is built for tradition, yet the young seem to be turning away. How do you intend to maintain interest in future years?
Pierre Lurton: Château d’Yquem is a timeless wine and meets the desirable criteria of young people who are discovering a more modern way of tasting, by discovering young vintages, served chilled, as an aperitif, or at the beginning of a meal of less traditional dishes.
Winefullness: When the Lurton family meet for dinner what are the most popular subjects to discuss, other than wine?
Pierre: With my cousins, we talk a lot about boats, because, while having our feet on the ground, we look at the horizon and the great outdoors. The sea and travel are also our passions.
Winefullness: In your opinion, what makes d’Yquem so unique?
Pierre Lurton: It is the wine of time travel par excellence. Château d’Yquem passes the centuries with great elegance.
Winefullness Magazine: Outside of Bordeaux, is there an appellation that really excites, and why?
Pierre Lurton: I love Burgundy for the diversity of its terroirs, its climates and for the purity of its wine.
Winefullness: Why have the wines of Sauternes and Balsac been underperforming in recent En Primeur campaigns?
Pierre: The tasting of Sauternes En Premeur is always a great success. The wines of this appellation are an immediate pleasure, but unfortunately, in direct competition with red wines, they seem to be bought by the consumer only later.
Winefullness: On your website it proclaims that some people enjoy the wine when it is over 30 years old and some enjoy it young. For you, when is the ideal time to take a glass?
Pierre Lurton: A young vintage of d’Yquem is a delicacy as an aperitif, and a d’Yquem over 30 years old is a splendour at the end of a meal as a desert.
Winefullness Magazine: Have wines like Château d'Yquem become tarnished because of the labels, dessert or sweet wines?
Pierre: It seems important to me to get away from this idea of dessert wine, which is too restrictive. Moreover, the sugar of the dessert is not the best friend of our wines. I also like to point out that there is always an excellent pretext to open a bottle.
Winefullness: At the end of a hard day, what does Pierre Lurton do to escape the pressures of the wine industry?
Pierre Lurton: I find myself in my secret garden: Chateau Marjosse, to breathe in the countryside as I walk through the meadows and woods bordering the vines. Then I take a good book to escape.
Winefullness: With the constant acquisition of Bordeaux vineyards by big corporations, is there still a place for the small producer when chequebooks are waived?
Pierre Lurton: If you like the quality of life at a lower price, it is always possible to buy in the beautiful region of the Entre-Deux-Mers, which I love so much. It is easy to find between meadows and woods, a pretty stone house with a few rows of vines.
Winefullness: There seems to be a consistent approach that Château d’Yquem. What do you do to make sure that the staff turnover is kept to a minimum?
Pierre Lurton: I keep the qualitative memory of the estate; I perpetuate the traditions with accents of modernity.
Winefullness: Are there times when you have thought about giving up the wine business?
Pierre Lurton: I started in medical school, but soon I realised that my DNA was taking over and I was going to devote my life to winemaking. And I never questioned that decision. it's in the world of wine where I’m at my best.
Winefullness: Do you think that below the surface of every French person there is the heart of a wine connoisseur mixed with the mind of a philosopher, or has the nation moved away from these ideals?
Pierre Lurton: In every Frenchman, a wine critic slumbers! Criticism is a very French speciality. I really think that French people have the cultural and heritage dimension of wine of wine.
Winefullness: What does the future hold for Pierre Lurton and for Chateau d'Yquem?
Pierre Lurton: My mission, like that of my predecessors, as well as the person who will take over from me, is to continue this quest for excellence.
Winefullness: What question do you wish you've been asked and why?
Pierre: No more questions, just a small glass of d’Yquem and a big thank you for your patience.
I love Pierre’s comments that inside every Frenchman a wine critic slumbers, and though there have been moments in the history of French wine when perhaps the ability towards self-criticism has been missing, I feel that the best French wines and the best French winemakers are never far away from the poetry of their wine.
This understanding of what is in the bottle is a merger of terroir, history, passion and taste that others strive to achieve, but that people such as Pierre Lurton naturally understand us part of their world.
If greatness and class are eternal, then as I gently sip my glass of Château d’Yquem, I see no reason why this producer of sweet beauty will not continue long.
