The “brand” Pierre-Henri Morel was created in 2008 when Pierre-Henri Morel and Michel Chapoutier purchased twenty acres of vineyards aged around 50 years old in Châteauneuf-du-Pape located in the Pignan, Bois Dauphin and Barbe d’Asne lieux-dits. Pierre-Henri is wholly responsible for the style of the wines, which are made at Chapoutier using the full extent of the equipment and expertise available there. His day-time job is as Chapoutier’s commercial director, having joined the company in 2000 and been deeply involved in its management since.
The old Pignan and Bois-Dauphin vineyards, planted mostly with Grenache and Syrah are farmed without synthetic chemical input and form the centre-piece of this range of wines, supplemented with the Gigondas and Côtes du Rhône Villages wines from fruit that Pierre-Henri finds especially appealing.
Pierre-Henri is fascinated by the southern Rhône Valley, by the amazing variety of its soils and by the Grenache grape variety. A few other wines round out the line: Côtes du Rhône Villages Laudun and Signargues, from the right bank of the Rhône facing Châteauneuf-du-Pape, are outstanding values, and a Gigondas, made from plots located on high-altitude terraces made of alluvial soils that endow the wines with lovely freshness, balance and minerality. To quote the man himself: “My wish is to share the passion that I have for this region across a quality selection that respects the typical expression of some of the most beautiful vineyard parcels of vines in the southern Rhône.”
