J.L. Chave Selection Crozes-Hermitage Blanc Sybele 2024

Domaine Jean-Louis Chave

From the family's own vines on the hill of Hermitage and the slopes of Saint-Joseph.

• Hermitage Rouge Syrah from parcels across the hill, among them Bessards, Méal, L'Hermite and Péléat. Each is fermented and aged on its own, and the blend is decided only at the end. This is the family's case for Hermitage as one wine rather than a set of single-vineyard bottlings.
• Hermitage Blanc Mostly Marsanne with some Roussanne. Weighty, slow to open, and built for the cellar; give a young bottle a long decant or ten years.
• Hermitage Cuvée Cathelin A separate red Hermitage first made in 1990 and bottled only in a handful of vintages since, when Jean-Louis judges the year can carry it.
• Saint-Joseph Syrah from the family's home slopes around Mauves, many of them terraces Jean-Louis replanted after a century of abandonment following phylloxera.
• Saint-Joseph Clos Florentin A walled four-hectare vineyard at the southern edge of Mauves, on decomposed granite washed down from the escarpments above. A previous owner farmed it for decades without chemical sprays or fertilizer; the Chaves now bottle it on its own.

J.L. Chave Sélection

Jean-Louis started the Sélection label in 1995, at first with grapes bought from Saint-Joseph growers he knew well. As the family's replanted vineyards came into production, more and more of the fruit has come from Chave's own vines, and Offerus and the Hermitage bottlings now come entirely from them. Same cellar and the same hands as the domaine wines, made to drink earlier and priced well below them.

• Hermitage Farconnet Red Hermitage from Diognières, Péléat and Greffieux, fermented in tonneaux and steel and aged 18 to 24 months in barrel. Named for the Farconnet family, from whom the Chaves acquired part of their Bessards holding.
• Hermitage Blanche Mostly Marsanne with Roussanne from Péléat, Maison Blanche and L'Hermite, fermented and aged 18 to 24 months in barriques.
• Saint-Joseph Offerus The first Sélection wine, in 1995. Syrah, now drawn from the family's own vineyards in the southern communes of Saint-Joseph.
• Saint-Joseph Blanc Circa Roussanne from the granite slopes of Mauves, first made in 2009.
• Crozes-Hermitage Silène Syrah from granite hillside parcels in Larnage and Gervans, part of it from estate vines planted in the early 2000s, aged 15 to 18 months in large casks.
• Crozes-Hermitage Blanc Sybèle Marsanne and Roussanne from Larnage, where decomposed granite leaves a white, kaolin-rich clay. Native-yeast fermentation, then 15 to 18 months in used oak.
• Côtes-du-Rhône Mon Coeur Grenache and Syrah from older vines in the southern Rhône hill villages around Vinsobres, fermented parcel by parcel and aged in large casks. The weeknight Chave.