Château de biran

CHÂTEAU DE BIRAN PÉCHARMANT

TThis 17th century château, whose name “Biran” is said to mean “tower of the horizon”, is a ten-hectare vine growing property overlooking the right bank of the Dordogne river.

With a full southern exposure, its sunshine is favourable to the early ripening of the grapes and allows a better concentration of sugars and aromas. Its soil is called “Tran” (a layer of ferruginous clay) and this gives the Pecharmant wines a unique terroir taste.

Its terrain is made up of a plateau, where Merlot is planted, and a hillside where Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon are planted, grape varieties that ripen later.

Characteristics of its soil

The particularity of this clay and gravel soil comes from the transformation of the granite rocks of the Massif Central by superficial leaching of the rivers, carrying clay and iron in the subsoil. The combination of these sands and gravels of the Perigord is called “Tran” because of a deep and impermeable layer of ferruginous clay which gives Pecharmant its specific terroir taste.

Merlot and Cabernet Franc thrive in these soils and produce elegant and powerful wines. The subsoil is composed of three different geological layers, all three of sedimentary origin. At the top of the hillside we find feldspathic sands, gravel and pebbles with greenish clay layers with mottling from the Eocene. On the way down, there are yellow sandstone limestones with flints from the Campanian (Upper Cretaceous) and in places a fluvial subsoil of pebbles and ruby sands.

Its plateau and its hillside

The five and a half hectares of Merlot are located on the highest part of the property, which is also called a “Pech” (a small hill covered with vines). The soil is mainly composed of Tran (a thin layer of ferruginous clay), sand and gravel. The grapes are at their peak of ripeness here and the exceptional sunshine induces a perfect concentration of sugars and aromas. The Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon vines are located on a south-facing slope overlooking the Dordogne. This exposure allows us to get the best out of these grape varieties, which are often harvested relatively late. The soil, consisting of a mixture of flint and Tran is quick to dry out and therefore warms up very quickly in the spring, which causes the grapes to ripen earlier.

The exceptional sunshine of this terroir, as well as the particular diversity of the soil (part of the vines are located on the break between the Pecharmant plateau and the nearby Dordogne river), give the wines of Château de Biran their aromatic singularity, power and generosity.