From curator Siôn Iorwerth:

 

"Christophe Foucher, the man behind La Lunotte, has a quiet character that is captured in the pastoral illustrations adorning his labels. The images feature his modest chai, which is located in the hamlet of Couffy near the Touraine river that runs through the Loire valley. 

During our visit to Christophe a few years ago, we first drove up the nearby hill to some of his Sauvignon Blanc vines. Planted on a mix of clay and sandy soils that felt springy with cover crops underfoot, they were punctuated by silex rocks glistening among the soil, remnants of the French civil war and the use of silex as gunflint for igniting rifles. Christophe prunes each of these vines on his own, preferring to work alone and ponder the energy that each plant presents.  

Christophe’s cellar belongs to a different time. Indeed, the building that houses it dates back to the early 1900s, and the thick tuffeau walls mean that there is a real drop in temperature as you climb through the small hatch into the damp, dark, barrel-filled room. The wines are given a long and undisturbed time in barrel, resulting in texturally rich, saline, and slightly oxidative Sauvignon Blancs more reminiscent of wines of the Jura than some of the mass-produced green and insipid whites that the Loire is sadly known for. 

His patience in keeping wines in barrels or held back in bottles until he deems them ready to sell is a great treat as an importer, for the wines have had time to find themselves and are ready to enjoy by the time they reach us.