Why Did Alfred Tesseron Wait Ten Years After Taking Over to Begin Remaking the Vineyard? — Château Pontet-Canet

On the outskirts of Pauillac, walking through the vineyards of Château Pontet-Canet, a Fifth Growth estate, one encounters a scene where horses—not heavy machinery—move between the rows. They were introduced in 2008. The reason was simple: to avoid heavy machines compacting the soil, and to protect the old vines.

Alfred Tesseron has led this vineyard since 1994. Having worked twenty years alongside his father Guy before being entrusted with the estate, he was a man who questioned the conventions and assumptions then firmly established, and reconsidered how the vines should be farmed. But the vineyard did not change the moment he took over. It was only in 2004, ten years after he took the helm, that the conversion to biodynamic farming finally began, and four years after that, horses were brought into the vineyard. Why these ten years? The answer lies at the far end of a family’s story that has passed through this land across three centuries.

Two Plots of Land, Joined Straight Into a Name

The name “Pontet-Canet” is nothing more than the names of two plots of land added together. In 1705, a man named Jean-François de Pontet brought together land in the northern part of the commune of Pauillac and established a vineyard. This man held the court position of Grand Maréchal des Logis of France under Louis XV, and is also said to have later settled in Guyenne and become governor of the Médoc. The court at Versailles, and the vineyard at Pauillac—that these two coexisted within the same person is the story of this land’s beginning.

In 1757, de Pontet acquired the land at Canet. In 1781, following the custom of the time, he joined his own family name with the name of the land he had acquired, and the name “Pontet-Canet” came into being. The name was something like a marriage of two plots of land, and by the time the estate was chosen as a Fifth Growth in the 1855 Classification, this name had already taken root.

Through the Hands of a Broker, and of Skawinski

Ten years after the Classification, in 1865, the influential Bordeaux broker Henri Herman Cruse acquired the estate and modernized its infrastructure. In 1895, he brought in Charles Skawinski, known at the time as a manager of Médoc estates, and built a new cellar. This cellar, said to have been fitted with equipment advanced for its era, still stands in active use today as a wooden fermentation room—what is now called the “Skawinski Room” is a remnant of this period.

The estate’s next major turning point came in 1975, when Guy Tesseron bought Pontet-Canet. It marked the shift from the “era of brokers and managers” that had run through Cruse and Skawinski, to an “era of a single family facing the vineyard.”

Alfred Tesseron’s Twenty Years

It was in 1994 that Alfred, the son who had worked twenty years under Guy Tesseron, was entrusted with running the estate. Even after taking charge, Alfred continued to search for a way of farming that took into account the sensitivity of the vine as a plant. His brother Gérard is said to have remained his most faithful support throughout his life.

His challenge to conventional thinking took concrete form in 2004, ten years after he took over. He began by converting 14 hectares of Merlot parcels to biodynamic farming. The following year, this decision was extended further, and it was decided to convert the entire estate to biodynamic farming. In 2010, the estate obtained dual certification in organic and biodynamic farming.

From 2008, horse-drawn ploughing was introduced. Today, around ten Percheron horses handle ploughing and spraying across half the vineyard. Records from 2010 state that the area worked by horses expanded from 7 hectares to 24 hectares. Within the estate’s total 81 hectares—some 100 parcels and 800,000 vines, overlooking the Gironde estuary—24 hectares amounts to a little under three-tenths of the whole.

Inside the cellar, an even longer span of time than these twenty years has accumulated. The nineteenth-century Skawinski Room, the concrete Nicole Room completed in 2005, and the amphora room completed in 2017. The last of these, the amphora room, is said to be designed to use no electricity, drawing on Roman-era models, and to use silica taken from the estate’s own soil. Wood from the nineteenth century, concrete from the early twenty-first, and a design without electricity harking back to antiquity—the hands of proprietors across three centuries remain layered within the same cellar.

2015: To the Next Generation

In 2015, Alfred’s daughter Justine Tesseron joined the management of the estate. The official history records that her involvement “brought new energy to the family business,” and also relates that, while respecting her father’s work, she held her own direction for guiding the estate. Today’s co-owners are the family, including her brother Noé and cousins Mélanie and Philippine.

More than three hundred years have passed since the man who established a vineyard on this land in 1705. After the era of brokers, the son entrusted with the estate by Guy took ten years from taking charge to question convention and remake the vineyard. And now, his daughter’s generation stands upon this estate.

Three Facts Worth Knowing

• The name “Pontet-Canet” is simply an addition of two plots of land. To the vineyard founded by Jean-François de Pontet in 1705 was added the land at Canet, acquired in 1757, and in 1781, following the custom of the time, the two names were joined to form the name.
• Three generations of fermentation rooms still stand in active use inside the cellar. The nineteenth-century Skawinski Room (wood), the Nicole Room completed in 2005 (concrete), and the amphora room completed in 2017 (designed to use no electricity, drawing on Roman-era models, using silica from the estate’s own soil)—the work of three centuries lies layered within the same cellar.
• It is still around ten horses that plough the vineyard today. They were introduced in 2008, and records show that by 2010 the area they worked had expanded from 7 hectares to 24 hectares—an area amounting to a little under three-tenths of the estate’s total 81 hectares.