Maison Les Alexandrins Crozes-Hermitage Rouge - 2025

A partnership between two winegrowers from the Rhône Valley – Nicolas Jaboulet and Alexandre Caso – Maison les Alexandrins produces northern wines in a style at once contemporary and timeless, always from exceptional vineyards unearthed by Alexandre Caso, a specialist in the terroirs of the northern Rhône Valley. Classics with a twist, these wines and how they are aged and blended are guided by the quest for perfect harmony from a very young age. Part of our blend comes from the village of Beaumont Monteux which produces very generous, precise wines. This is rounded out with wine from a locality called Les Pends, near Mercurol, for depth and acidity.

The terroir comprises granite slopes to the north, similar to those in Hermitage, while the soil to the south is mainly alluvial with some terraces containing stones washed up by the Rhône. The vines are planted on slopes facing due south benefiting from the Mistral breeze. There is a great difference between the wines produced in the north or in the south of the appellation. Maison les Alexandrins’ Crozes-Hermitages mainly come from vines planted in the alluvial plain.

Marked by contrasting climatic conditions, the 2025 vintage was a demanding, yet a promising year. After flowering under intense sunshine, a hailstorm at the end of June, and then a scorching August, the vines demonstrated remarkable resilience. While yields remained modest, the quality of the grapes concentrated, perfectly healthy, and exemplarily ripe promises great wines. The Roussanne and Marsanne, particularly early, opened the white harvest before the later-ripening Viognier, offering a nice spread out harvest. Syrah reached a uniform maturity across all appellations, requiring a quick and precise harvest. In the cellar, the reds revealed very healthy grapes and concentrated musts, favoring gentle vatting and giving rise to wines with a deep color, fine tannins, and delicious aromas. The whites, in excellent sanitary health, are distinguished by their acidic balance, their well-integrated structure and their beautiful aromas typical of northern grape varieties. Both whites and reds require careful aging to express all the complexity of a mature, harmonious vintage that promises very good aging. Like other years ending with the number 5, 2025 could well be among the very great vintages.

An Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée in the northern Rhône Valley since 1937, the Crozes-Hermitage vineyard lies on the left bank of the Rhône, between the Hermitage and Saint-Joseph appellations. The earliest vines in this terroir were first grown in Roman times. Its name comes from two place names: “Crozes”, from the Latin crucem, which means “cross” or “crossroads”, and “Hermitage”, from the Latin heremitagium, meaning “hermitage” in English. It refers to the hill rising above the Rhône, on the summit of which the knight Henri Gaspard de Stérimberg settled to live as a hermit on his return from the Albigensian Crusade.

- Pre-fermentation cold maceration to develop the fruit.
- Maceration and fermentation for about 20 days with pumping over for the first few days and then punching down towards the end.
- Ageing in conical vats and demi-muids (60-litre capacity barrels) for 10 months.