The Château Palmer grape harvest gives the impression of a gentle sprint, a controlled frenzy. Each person knows their role by their heart, making timely adjustments and reacting calmly in the face of unpredictable weather ; embarking in September on a marathon of several weeks in a friendly and rather serene atmosphere.
“It's a happy time for us. The rest of the year, we work in separate teams. The harvest is when we all come together to take part in the grand finale.”
Driss — winegrower and groundskeeper on the estate
Driss, a winegrower and groundskeeper on the estate, sums up the general state of mind when harvest time rolls around: “It's a happy time for us. The rest of the year, we work in separate teams. The harvest is when we all come together to take part in the grand finale.” Some 15 winemakers are working around him: the “cutters”, red secateurs in hand, remove plump bunches of Merlot from the vines, alternating with the “porters” who, with crates harnessed to their backs, march back and forth between the vine stock and the truck. Château Palmer's permanent staff get to know the seasonal workers. During this period, the estate's staff jumps from 70 to 230 workers, bunches of men and women who make up the crucial patchwork of the harvest, joining forces to bring as many grapes as possible to the vat room. Here, separating the grapes from each plot is as important as uniting those who harvest them. Fruit is divided; people are mixed together.
While pillars of the estate Thomas Duroux, CEO of Château Palmer, and Sabrina Pernet, Technical Director, scour the vineyard, smelling and tasting the grapes, comparing, deciding which plots to harvest first and giving instructions, others are discovering the job: for several years now, refugees or people in very precarious situations have been joining the team and learning the winegrowing skills for the duration of the harvest. This commitment to the SOS Solidarités association is coupled with a partnership with the Younus academy for green harvest, in June, to help fifty young people from the Grand Parc district of Bordeaux into employment.
Driss, a practised winegrower, shares a powerful memory: “In 2022, for the first time, I supervised a team of refugees from Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan. Many of them were new to working in the vineyard and harvesting grapes. My role was to train them, to encourage them, or simply to give them a helping hand. This social and human dimension, this transmission of knowledge is very important to me. I was particularly touched by one young man, a political opponent who escaped from prison to go to France. He quickly distinguished himself: a sense of rhythm, skill and handiness. I invited him to join the team the following winter. I saw that he was cut out for this job...”
“This social and human dimension, this transmission of knowledge is very important to me.”
Driss — winegrower and groundskeeper on the estate
The in-house winegrowers supervise the newcomers, provide guidance and pass on their skills while the rest of the team is busy in the vat room.This is where all roads lead, where everything plays out under the high ceilings of the building next to the cellar. The beating heart of the hive, where the excellence of a vintage is concocted with second-by-second meticulous attention. The winemakers receive the pallets. They first sort the grapes by hand before turning to the indispensable arsenal of machinery, including destemmers, vibrating tables and optical sorters, which use high-speed cameras to detect and eject any unripe or bruised grapes. Only the highest-quality fruit is transported into the small, mobile vats — at a speed of 499 feet per minute — then into the main vat where two to four weeks of fermentation await.
Hands whirl and brains buzz around the machines. The bunches, individual berries and waste products are weighed, estimations are corrected, data is reassessed. "This is the control tower," says a smiling Fabien, who monitors the traceability of each delivery on his computer screen. The harvest is known for its physical demands, but also implies endless calculations, from the flurry of pallets and the number of hectolitres per hectare to the density of each vat and the pin-point temperatures. Every single step is perpetually adapted and adjusted.
This crucial, infinitesimal task continues on the floor above with the technical tasting process. Eleven bottles containing a sample from each vat are lined up on a table, ready to be swilled, inhaled and carefully compared. Thomas and Sabrina check that each fermentation is coming to fruition. Even at this stage they comment on the future vintage, plot by plot, assisted by cellar master Olivier and Hervé, a trained chemist, who has prepared the pied de cuve with natural yeasts of which he has the secret.
In the cellars, trainees accompanied by the teams "pump over" the must onto the top of the vat, before letting it flow back down through the grapes and the pomace, absorbing, darkening, and developing its structure. This operation is repeated three times a day. This is when the skeleton of the wine is formed. The foundations and key flavours of the vintage take shape. During the week of fermentation, all the vats are tasted every day - fifty-four in total! A cutting-edge science that draws on the nose and the palate, requiring memory and intuition. A decisive instant in which four people sketch the soul of the wine by imagining potential combinations and anticipating future blends.
Another more light-hearted and restorative tasting session then begins. As a reward for twelve months of hard work, a shared lunch is held under a marquee a stone's throw from the cellar. A traditional truce, a leisurely break attended by winemakers, cellar workers, and all those who form the lifeblood of the estate. Even the chickens are there, waiting for a kindly hand to throw them the last pieces of bread left on the checked table cloth.
