News from the Provence wine world so you know what’s going on!

It’s starting to get crowded with celebrities in the Provencal wine estates! 13 years ago, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie bought the Château Miraval winery outside Correns for € 55 million. Four years ago, George Lucas, the creator of the Star Wars movies, bought the Château Margüi vineyard outside the small village of Châteauvert, just a few kilometers north of the Château Miraval. The 15-hectare winery is now part of George Lucas’ winery empire “Skywalker Vineyards”.

Recently, actor George Clooney has bought the Domaine du Canadel wine estate for around € 8 to € 10 million, which is only a 20 – 30 minutes’ drive from his “American friends”, i.e., close to the towns of Brignoles and Correns. The house is from the 18th century and the grapes from the 5 hectares vineyard today go to the cooperative in Correns, but maybe Clooney, like his “American friends”, will start producing wine?

However, there was a problem with the purchase when it turned out that another buyer showed up who claims to have bought the estate for a lower amount. On July 23, the local mayor reported that the Cloney couple has now arrived, so it must be assumed that they are now rightful owners.

Source: Vitisphere

After the catastrophic cold nights in April that hit the vineyards in France extremely hard, and as WinesofProvence reported earlier, there have now been estimates of how much the wine harvest in 2021 will be affected. An estimate is that the harvest this year will be 32 million hl (hectoliters), which is a reduction of about 15 million hl. Thus, the harvest will be smaller than that affected by frost in 2017, where the harvest was 38 million hl. The losses in 2021 are estimated at between 1.5 and 2 billion EURO!

For Provence, the harvest loss is estimated at 30%.

Source: Vitisphere