Gonnet Père et Fils

Since 2007 Famille Gonnet and the family brand for Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Font de Vent, has been run by cousins Guillaume and Bertrand Gonnet.

Guillaume learnt his trade with vintages at Leflaive in Puligny-Montrachet and Château Beau-Sejour Becot in St Emilion with a year in the Napa Valley. They are the third generation of the family domaine, which was started in 1950 by their grandfather Etienne, although records show there has been Gonnets in Bédarrides since the 1600s. When Etienne was younger the family farmed produce such as rabbits, pigeons and eggs, however an outbreak of Myxomatosis destroyed the export market so they turned to planting vines. Etienne already had a small vineyard from his father and this was further added to by his new wife, Jeanne Brunier of the Domaine du Vieux Télégraphe family, who had her own vines too. Fast forward over 70 years and the domaine is fully organic, with Guillaume noting “organics makes our vines stronger preventing disease, as the vines go deeper into the soils”. Their aim is to create wines that drink well early and have the ability to cellar, over the years, they insist, the style has not changed but rather has been refined and improved. Vines are around 50 to 110 years old and most wines are a field blend with around 75% Grenache as the base.