United by an extraordinary story
Founded in 1995, Maison Calmel & Joseph is a story of teamwork and passion. After careers spent working around the world, Jérôme Joseph and Laurent Calmel purchased a wine estate at the end of Chemin de la Madone, just a stone’s throw from Carcassonne’s fairytale walled Cité (a UNESCO World Heritage Site), in the west of the Corbières appellation.
Languedoc-Roussillon is a wine region of endless possibilities.
Calmel & Joseph have patiently developed strong relationships with partner-winegrowers across the region’s appellations to create a wide range of wines, following the process every stop of the way, from vineyard to bottle. They believe in the unique potential of these terroirs, and their work is dedicated to revealing their potential, through vinification, blending, ageing and then marketing, in France and around the world.
Calmel & Joseph’s production spans roughly 50 wines, designed to illustrate the exceptional identity of this Mediterranean region while enhancing a wide range of wining and dining occasions.
Our identity: site-specific selections
At Calmel & Joseph, we maintain close, long-standing relationships with our winegrower partners. Our plot selection approach and the unique bond shared with the growers are part of our DNA, and set us apart within the industry. The plots we use are rigorously selected, to reflect our unwavering commitment to preserving freshness, finesse and elegance in our wines.
Being in the warm Mediterranean region, our preference is for cooler terroirs often found at the very limits of vine cultivation, in the foothills of the mountains surrounding the Languedoc basin.
Once the area has been chosen, we look for plots whose intrinsic character has been preserved by being farmed naturally. By working with this extended family of Languedoc winegrowers, we are effectively writing stories together year after year, with another chapter added every vintage.
The art of living simply
Few regions display as much dynamism and creativity as Languedoc-Roussillon, where life is lived to the full. Over the last three decades, new winegrowers have been arriving, putting down roots on the region’s stony ground and rugged terroirs bathed in sunshine and buffeted by the winds. In silence, they are writing their own personal stories.
“Do as Goethe did: seek the Orient at your feet. The Orient of France is the Midi,” said French writer and poet Joseph Delteil with characteristic southern eloquence. According to Delteil, Palaeolithic cuisine is the cuisine of God and this resonates with our grower-partners who understand the natural, unadorned cuisine and art brut of the Languedoc
Discover Calmel & Joseph’s creations
Winemaking
The annual grape harvest is a crucial moment, as it determines the future balance of the wine. The winemaking process is important, but the fruit is the essential foundation of a successful vintage. Without fine grapes, there is little chance of producing great wines. We aim to preserve the acidity – the very backbone of our future vintage – while respecting the maturity of each grape variety. The grapes are picked, mostly destemmed and then sorted, and our wines ferment naturally, taking as long as they need. Naturally, our grower-partners share this philosophy.
Blending
This delicate operation is where the wines from each plot are brought together. Each wine has its own identity and personality. Terroir is respected, as is each wine’s potential. The blending components vary with each vintage, but by working with the same plots year after year, we can picture the final blend before it is actually made.
Samples of each variety are taken and tasted, vat by vat, barrel by barrel. Once the blend has been made, it is tasted again after a few weeks in case it needs tweaking, and at this stage we decide whether to fine, filter or make any other minor adjustments before bottling.
Ageing
All our wines undergo traditional ageing in concrete vats for a period of 16 -18 months. The wine is racked several times to remove the coarse lees have been removed, leaving it on fine lees, and sometimes the wine is racked at 6 – 12 months if it is not expressing itself fully.
For our ‘Les Crus’, ‘Les Cuvées Rares’ and ‘Le Domaine’ ranges, the wine is aged in different sized barrels (225 litres, 450 litres and 2,000-litre casks). We use very little new oak, preferring barrels that have previously held white wine for 3 – 6 months. The barrels are regularly topped up and tasted to monitor the wine’s development.
Languedoc-Roussillon
History of the region
The history of the Languedoc wine region began with the Greeks, who introduced vines in the 5th century BC. However, it was under Roman influence that the region’s wine industry really took off, and ever since then, wine has played a highly important role in the area’s economy.
The Languedoc-Roussillon wine region stretches from the area around Nîmes to the border with Spain, essentially across the three départements of Aude, Gard and Hérault. A regional appellation called AOP Languedoc was created in 2007 and covers both the Languedoc and Roussillon areas.
- A total area of 40,000 hectares
- 18 Protected Designations of Origin
- A vast diversity of terroirs, each with its own distinct soils, climates and grape varieties.
There is a stark contrast between the harsh terrain of the foothills of the Pyrenees and the Massif Central, and the gentle slopes of the Mediterranean coast. Along the coast, the soils are generally composed of sand, limestone or clay. Where the small ridges and valleys begin, schist soil begins to emerge, with vast terraces of rounded pebbles. The climate is generally Mediterranean, but head inland and cooler conditions emerge.
The grape varieties of the Languedoc vineyards are also very diverse. Whilst the most renowned – Syrah, Grenache, Mourvèdre, Carignan and Cinsault – make up the bulk of the vineyards, there are other, lesser-known names (think Cot, Lladoner Pelut, Rolle and so on), some of them indigenous varieties.
Indeed, the region is blessed with a veritable mosaic of terroirs and landscapes.
