Anson: Tasting top La Conseillante and Figeac vintages

Back in February 2013, Marie-France Manoncourt named Jean-Valmy Nicolas as co-director of Château Figeac, Premier Grand Cru Classé B in St-Emilion, alongside Frédéric Faye.

Figeac had been in the Manoncourt family since 1892, and the news caused a minor earthquake at the time because Nicolas was already co-director, and owner, of Château La Conseillante, just over the border from Figeac in the neighbouring appellation of Pomerol.

Scroll down to see Jane Anson’s tasting notes and scores for La Conseillante and Figeac wines

It’s not exactly a usual occurrence in Bordeaux to ask a neighbouring château to help out in running things – although there is precedent; Jean-Michel Cazes of Lynch Bages headed up Pichon Baron in Pauillac for many years.

But there are parallels between La Conseillante and Figeac that made this decision make sense, and it is a situation that remains in place today, eight years later.

For a start, the Nicolas family has been at La Conseillante for even longer than the Manoncourts, with Louis Nicolas buying the property in 1871.

Commenting on the move at the time, Challenges magazine in France suggested that the reason to pull together was to form a ‘defensive union’, with the intention of ‘resisting the assaults of big companies and international investors’.

This seems to have been a sensible move, certainly when you look at the price of land in both Pomerol and St-Emilion over the past decade.

A single hectare of the best quality vines in both appellations has shot skywards since 2013, coming in at anything from €2m to €5m, putting ever greater pressure on families hoping to pass on their estates to the next generation.

And we have seen the arrival of several big companies over the same timescale – most notably SCORE Insurance at Château Troplong Mondot in 2017.

Jean-Valmy Nicolas

Regarding La Conseillante and Figeac, ‘there is no intention to exchange ownership of either property,’ Jean-Valmy Nicolas underlined at the time of the new arrangement. ‘But the Manoncourts contacted me at a moment that Figeac is looking for a new injection of energy, just as we were doing at La Conseillante a decade ago.’

This was no doubt true, after Figeac missed out on promotion during the 2012 St-Emilion classification, and it’s interesting to note that 2013 was the time Michel Rolland came on as consultant at both properties.

But another clear reason was that Nicolas had particular skills that came from his experience in estate planning.

He is a graduate of France’s prestigious HEC business school, a popular diploma among wine glitterati, with Frédéric Engerer at Latour and Aurélian Valence at Margaux among the other notable graduates.

Nicolas also works in private equity at Vespa Capital, with a specialty in management of privately-owned businesses. He no doubt helped ensure a smooth transition to today’s structure, where both Hortense-Idoine Manoncourt and Blandine de Brier-Manoncourt represent the next generation of the family, working alongside their mother Marie-France.

La Conseillante and Figeac share similar terroir

Figeac is one of the biggest estates in St-Emilion at 41 hectares (Fombrauge has overtaken it at 58ha), with La Conseillante a mid-sized Pomerol property at 11.79 hectares.

Both share a similar terroir of gravel and clay, and both shared a reputation of being classical, understated examples of their respective appellations.

This is a reputation that again both have worked to shed – or rather to hold on to while subtly expanding the mid-palate expression and depth of concentration in their fruit expression.

I last did an in-depth vertical of the two estates a few years ago, and it was fascinating to revisit them here, at a time that they are marking key events; 150 years of ownership for the Nicolas family at La Conseillante and the unveiling of a new €15m winery at Château Figeac that has been three years in construction.

New cellars at Figeac

The new cellars at Figeac have put the focus on the use of recycled materials.

Stone walls and oak beams from the existing 19th century cellar have been taken down and reused wherever possible, for example, and 220 cubic metres of extra limestone stone brought in from other sites rather than newly mined.

Local and regional firms were employed throughout, with the overall footprint of the building reduced by 20% by setting it out across three floors, set into the hill (okay, slope) of the Figeac vineyard.

Around 63% of the building is underground down to 12 metres, allowing for energy savings and natural air temperature control.

It’s an impressive result, and one that suggests that Figeac may well be hoping that the next round of the classification, in 2022, ends rather differently than the last one.

See Jane Anson’s tasting notes and scores for La Conseillante wines back to 2005, and also Figeac 1970, 1989 and 2009

More recent articles by Jane Anson: 

Tasting upcoming releases: From Latour 2013 to Ornellaia 2018

How the 1990 first growths taste now

Lafleur 2018 and the battle against climate change