The most important thing to remember about this year in the vineyards is the capricious weather, but above all the responsiveness and hard work of the teams. The harvest will begin on the night of Sunday August 20 to Monday August 21 at Château Sainte Roseline and Château des Demoiselles, at La Motte. They will last about 1 month.
We always prefer harvesting at night, when temperatures are naturally cooler than during the day, to preserve the quality of the grapes and exploit all the fruit's aromas while retaining maximum freshness. Our obsession with pale, pure colors for our Rosé and White wines is a real commitment, which is why we harvest at night to avoid oxidation and discoloration.
Harvesting begins with the Rolle and Tibouren plots used to make our white and rosé wines.
A recap of capricious weather
This year's weather was full of ups and downs, with a lot of humidity in the spring, which required constant vigilance on the part of our teams from a phytosanitary point of view, particularly with organic production. This was followed by a few weeks of heatwave followed by a cooler period, which slightly delayed the grapes' veraison. The last week before the harvest was marked by a heat wave and sampling to determine the best harvest date and action plan.
A fine vintage in prospect
The harvest looks set to be a qualitative one, with a more generous quantity than last year. It will of course be enhanced by the work accomplished in the cellar by our oenologist, Marco Bealessio, and his teams. This harvest will mark the second certified organic vintage for the estates.
Sharing our know-how with our teams
Once again this year, we're organizing an in-house day that we like to call "Harvest Cohesion Day", when our teams - from sales to accounting to marketing - take part in the harvest. They come to hand-pick a few rows, and then a little novelty: sort the grapes... a good way of passing on to our employees the know-how specific to our estates, while sharing a convivial moment.
WORDS FROM...
Eric Henry, General Director
"The long-awaited start of the harvest has arrived for Château Sainte Roseline and Château des Demoiselles. The teams are ready to harvest the first early grape varieties of the 2 châteaux: Tibouren, Rolle, Caladoc. Even our sunniest Grenaches are ready to be harvested.
While the weather conditions are no longer a surprise to anyone, these 2023 harvests are at last the culmination of hard work by our teams to combat the rainy weather of May and June in order to maintain perfect sanitary quality. What's more, with the late heat of August, ripening was finally in line with the average of recent years. Once again, nature has decided for us...
We wish our teams and all our colleagues in Provence a very fine harvest".
Charles Modaine, Manager of Vignoble Sainte
Roseline
"These harvests are the result of a beautiful and intense year of work, and we hope that the results will be there. Well done to all my teams for this year, which has not been the easiest, and happy harvesting to all!"
