Château de Saint-Cosme

Saint Cosme lies in the heart of the Gigondas appellation, and its Gallo-Roman winery, with fermentation tanks hewn into the rock, has withstood the test of time. Gigondas was then part of the principality of Orange, which was annexed to France only in 1703. In 1480 John of Chalon, Prince of Orange, sold lands for vineyards on the hillside of Saint Cosme; the land later changed hands and came to the family's ancestor Esprit Vaton in 1490. The Saint Cosme chapel, in the heart of the vineyards, is a Romanesque building of the 11th and 12th centuries. Henri Barruol managed the family winery for 35 years, and in 1992 Louis Barruol, then 23 and studying for an MBA in Paris, took over. The estate was then selling bulk wine; Louis Barruol began bottling its wines. In 1997 he created a merchant wine business that combines a winegrowing perspective with classic shipping. The family acquired Château de Rouanne in Vinsobres in 2019 and the old vineyard at Pied-Gu, near Saint Cosme, in 2024.

• 1480: John of Chalon, Prince of Orange, sold lands for vineyards on the hillside of Saint Cosme; 1490: the land came to the family's ancestor Esprit Vaton.
• The Gallo-Roman winery has fermentation tanks hewn into the rock; the chapel dates from the 11th and 12th centuries.
• 1992: Louis Barruol took over from his father Henri and began bottling the estate's wines; 1997: merchant wine business founded.
• 2019: Château de Rouanne in Vinsobres acquired; 2024: the Pied-Gu vineyard acquired.

As of the estate's 2026 booklet, Louis Barruol is proprietor of Château de Saint Cosme in Gigondas and of Château de Rouanne in Vinsobres. The Saint Cosme Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Côte-Rôtie, Saint-Joseph and Côtes du Rhône are bottled by SARL Louis et Cherry Barruol; Cherry Barruol is Louis Barruol's wife. As of the 2024 vintage, Louis Barruol was Co-President of the Gigondas appellation. Clarisse Borau made the 2022 Château de Rouanne Vinsobres, her first vintage as a winemaker at Rouanne. Louis Barruol's partner at Forge Cellars, the family's American estate on Seneca Lake, is Rick Rainey.

• Proprietor: Louis Barruol, at Saint Cosme and at Rouanne.
• Co-President of the Gigondas appellation (as of the 2024 vintage): Louis Barruol.
• Saint Cosme Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Côte-Rôtie, Saint-Joseph and Côtes du Rhône: bottled by SARL Louis et Cherry Barruol.
• Forge Cellars, Seneca Lake: Louis Barruol with his partner Rick Rainey.

The estate has 25 hectares of old vines with an average age of 60 and diminutive yields. Its soils are a geological mosaic created by the upheaval of the Dentelles de Montmirail, at the point where two geological faults meet, and the cool microclimate causes late ripening. Le Poste is the vineyard surrounding the Saint Cosme chapel: four terraces, three planted to Grenache and one to Clairette, replanted by Henri Barruol in 1963. It is formed of Tortonian limestone marl containing many fossils of marine shellfish, a soil found nowhere else in the Rhône Valley. Le Claux, from the Latin 'clausum', meaning closed, is a 1.8-hectare vineyard mentioned in the first vineyard land registry records of 1902 and probably planted after phylloxera, between 1870 and 1880. It was due to be pulled out in 1914, but the men went off to fight the war that August and it was not uprooted; Henri Barruol took it over in 1958 and rehabilitated it. Its soils are clay and limestone marl from the Miocene, with small sharp gravel on the surface, in the Font des Papes alluvial fan. Hominis Fides, also first mentioned in 1902, is one of the estate's oldest vineyards, on sandy limestone soils with no stones, formed from Swiss 'fawn sands' of the Middle Miocene, approximately 14 million years old; the bedrock usually appears less than one metre below ground. Pied-Gu, acquired in 2024, lies at 315 metres on Cretaceous limestone marl with an east-facing aspect and is mostly planted to old-vine Grenache. Four small terraces there are to be replanted with Clairette in 2027, making Pied-Gu the estate's third site-designated white Gigondas after Hominis Fides and Le Poste. White Les Deux Albions comes from a vineyard planted in 2014 in the limestone of Saint Martin.

• 25 hectares of old vines, average age 60, at the meeting point of two geological faults below the Dentelles de Montmirail.
• Le Poste: four terraces around the chapel, three of Grenache and one of Clairette, replanted in 1963 on Tortonian limestone marl.
• Le Claux: 1.8 hectares of Miocene clay and limestone marl in the Font des Papes alluvial fan, probably planted between 1870 and 1880.
• Hominis Fides: sandy limestone soils of Middle Miocene 'fawn sands', first mentioned in 1902.
• Pied-Gu: acquired 2024, 315 metres, Cretaceous limestone marl; Clairette to be planted in 2027.

Château de Rouanne, acquired in 2019, is a historic estate in Vinsobres surrounded by an unbroken 62-hectare vineyard. Its south-east-facing hillside holds the named vineyard sites Les Côtes, Rouanne et les Crottes, Guérin and La Palud, on Messinian, Tortonian and Pliocene soils of red clay, limestone marl and sand. The vineyards were mainly planted between 1955 and 1975 to massal selections of Grenache, Syrah and Mourvèdre and are farmed organically. The Alps begin to rise 9 km from the château, and the Pontias wind cools the Eygues valley below it. Forge Cellars on Seneca Lake in the Finger Lakes was established in 2011; its 21 named vineyards are farmed and fermented separately with wild ferments.

• Rouanne: 62 hectares in one unbroken block in Vinsobres, acquired 2019, farmed organically.
• Named sites at Rouanne: Les Côtes, Rouanne et les Crottes, Guérin and La Palud.
• Forge Cellars: established 2011 on Seneca Lake; 21 named vineyards.

By 1972 Henri Barruol had adopted organic winegrowing, to protect the ecosystem of the vale of Saint Cosme, particularly its bird population. The estate uses no weed killers, chemical fertilisers, pesticides or synthetic products, all its vineyards are hoed and tilled, and it counts biodynamic viticulture among its guiding lights. The Grenache vines are almost entirely trained on individual stakes, as in the northern Rhône. In the cellar the estate has always encouraged native yeasts. The red Gigondas are fermented as whole clusters. The 2024 estate Gigondas spent twelve months ageing: 15% in new casks, 50% in casks used for 1 to 4 wines and 35% in concrete tanks. The 2024 single-vineyard reds spent twelve months in casks, 20% of them new and 50% used for one wine. The white Gigondas Le Poste and Hominis Fides are 100% Clairette, fermented in used casks or old barrels and aged on fine lees for 10 months. The wines are bottled with no fining or filtering.

• Organic since at least 1972 under Henri Barruol; hoeing and tillage in all vineyards.
• Native yeasts; whole-cluster fermentation for the red Gigondas.
• 2024 estate Gigondas: twelve months, 15% new casks, 50% older casks, 35% concrete tanks.
• No fining or filtering at bottling.

The Château de Saint Cosme range comprises the estate Gigondas (the 2024 is 70% Grenache, 14% Syrah, 15% Mourvèdre and 1% Cinsault); the single-vineyard red Gigondas Hominis Fides, Le Claux and Le Poste, all from old Grenache; the white Gigondas Le Poste and Hominis Fides; and Les Deux Albions, a red Côtes du Rhône co-fermented from Mourvèdre, Syrah, Cinsaut, Grenache and Clairette, whose 2024 vintage marks its 25th anniversary. The white Les Deux Albions, an IGP Principauté d'Orange, is labelled Domaine de Saint Cosme. The Saint Cosme range also includes Châteauneuf-du-Pape from La Crau, Valori and Christia; Côte-Rôtie, Saint-Joseph and Crozes-Hermitage from Serine, an ancient form of Syrah; Condrieu from Viognier; and a Syrah Côtes du Rhône. The Vin de France Micro-Cosme comes as a red of Pinot Noir and Grenache, blended with Grenache soleras begun in 1999, and a white of Viognier and Sauvignon. Château de Rouanne makes Vinsobres, the named-vineyard Vinsobres Rouanne et les Crottes and Les Côtes, and a Brut Nature Rosé sparkling wine; Forge Cellars makes Riesling. Hominis Fides was first made in 2003, and Le Claux and Le Poste were first made as separate wines in 2006. Valbelle, a Gigondas first produced in 1993 from 90% Grenache and 10% Syrah, was discontinued after the 2015 vintage.

• Estate: Gigondas; Gigondas Hominis Fides, Le Claux and Le Poste (red); Gigondas Le Poste and Hominis Fides (white, 100% Clairette); Les Deux Albions (red Côtes du Rhône, white IGP Principauté d'Orange).
• Saint Cosme wines: Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Côte-Rôtie, Saint-Joseph, Crozes-Hermitage, Condrieu, Côtes du Rhône Syrah; Micro-Cosme red and white.
• Château de Rouanne: Vinsobres, Rouanne et les Crottes, Les Côtes and a Brut Nature Rosé.
• Valbelle (first made 1993) was discontinued after the 2015 vintage.

Wine Spectator ranked the 2022 Gigondas Wine #47 in its Top 100 of 2025, and named the estate's 2015 entry-level Gigondas Wine No. 5 of its Top 100 of 2017. In Decanter in 2019, Matt Walls found that the single-vineyard wines typically start to drink well after eight years, that 12 years is a better rule of thumb, and that they continue to develop for around 20 years or more; he added that the style, highly concentrated, tannic and oak-influenced when young, is one that not all critics agree on.

• 2022 Gigondas: Wine #47 in Wine Spectator's Top 100 of 2025.
• 2015 Gigondas: Wine No. 5 in Wine Spectator's Top 100 of 2017.
• Single-vineyard Gigondas: in Matt Walls' 2019 Decanter view, drinking well from about eight to 12 years and developing for 20 years or more.

The estate's own summary is 'Balance, freshness and finesse characterise our wines.' Louis Barruol puts it in his own words: 'I like to make wines that show pure, precise sense of place - wines that have personality and balance. I want them to have the propensity to age.' Of the 2024 Gigondas, he writes that 'whole cluster fermentation heightens the affinity that Saint Cosme has always shared with certain wines of Morey-Saint-Denis.'

Primary sources (producer's own site): https://www.saintcosme.com/ and the estate's 2026 booklet (PDF): https://www.saintcosme.com/upload/Booklet_2026_Eng_Page_HD.pdf. Official source: Inter Rhône, 2024 vintage report, https://www.vins-rhone.com/en/2024-vintage. Secondary sources: Wine Spectator (Mitch Frank, from the Nov. 30, 2013 issue; Gigondas 2022 rating page) and Decanter (Matt Walls, last updated 4 October 2019). Last verified 2026-10-18. Where the producer's site and a secondary source disagree, the producer's site governs.