Thomas Rouanet grew up in a grape-growing family in the Languedoc, near the wine producing village of Saint-Chinian and just an hour from Montpellier and the Mediterranean coast. He was surrounded by vineyards throughout his childhood but after flirting with the idea of training to become a sports teacher, he decided to take over the vines that his grandfather, who had hung up his pruning shears, tended for many years.

In 2008, he began studying for his winemaking qualification in Montpellier, and that was followed two years later by a more sales-oriented qualification. During this time, Thomas wanted to gain as much experience as possible in all aspects of the wine business. He worked part-time in wine sales, which didn’t really tick all the boxes. He worked also as a caviste, giving advice on and selling wines, which he enjoyed more because of the contact with the customers, but what he really wanted was hands-on work, in the vines. He got experience working with Yannick Pelletier in 2010 and continued making wines with him until 2014, but in 2013 he took over his grandfather’s vines around the beautiful Languedoc village of Creissan. For two years, Thomas had the task of making the wines both for Pelletier and himself. As he says, his days were very long around harvest time in 2013 and 2014, making wines at one location on Monday and Tuesday then doing the same elsewhere on Wednesday and Thursday.

Thomas now farms 5 hectares of vines - that’s around 12 acres - all situated near Creissan and which are made up both of vines farmed by his grandfather and other parcels that he has acquired since. His grandfather was a little ahead of his time, being certified organic since 1991, and it’s even more surprising given that he sold most of his grapes to the local co-operative. Thomas has parcels of old vines – some 70- and 75-year-old parcels of Carignan and Grenache Noir – and lesser-known grape varieties such as the Alicante Bouchet and Terret. Most of his five hectares are on terroirs of clay-limestone and are worked in a similar manner, with ploughing at the end of winter and passing around the base of the vines with field cultivator, known in France as an intercep, to remove unwanted greenery before finishing off the job by hand.

Winemaking takes place in his grandfather’s old cellar in the village, although the enormous concrete vats, constructed in 1929, hold far too much volume for Thomas’s small batch production. You could say that the winemaking style he adopted is more classic in approach compared to some of his contemporaries. Thomas apprenticed with Yannick Pelletier and so like him, Thomas uses a mix of destemmed and whole bunch maceration with periods from one to three weeks, yet he strives and succeeds in making wines with great fruit, tannins that are present but not aggressive, and above all, drinkability.

When asked what drove him to make wines naturally, Thomas said that like many, he had preconceived, and ill-conceived ideas at the time about natural wines but then told the story of one of those seminal moments while tasting the wines of Didier Barral from Faugères and Yannick Pelletier (whom Thomas later worked with) at renowned wine fair in nearby Bedarieux. Their wines just blew him away, and, the surprise? They were made naturally! Not only that, Thomas learnt that they were making these amazing wines nearby so his thought was, “well if they can make wines like that here, why can’t I?” Enjoy.  

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