HOUSE STYLE: The château itself is an icon of Bordeaux. Stephane Remael for the Wall Street Journal

BORDEAUX IS CHANGING. A construction boom is sweeping through its ancient byways and tranquil villages, transforming its sober, classical architecture with futuristic, curvaceous lines. If the château you choose to visit doesn't possess an interior-designed reception area or space-age vinification room, there will more than likely be a crane in the parking lot building one. In the 10 years that I have been visiting the region on a professional basis, it has undergone a remarkable overhaul as capital from a vastly expanded international market has flooded in. But one vital element remains largely untouched—the vineyards.

Nowhere is this more evident than at Château Margaux. Alongside the grand neo-classical mansion, workmen are busily creating British architect Norman Foster's vision for the new cellars and winemaking hall. Yet, fanning out northeast from the château itself, its vineyards have barely changed since they were laid out 300 years ago.

Paul Pontallier has been overseeing Château Margaux's wines for 30 years. Cephas / Jean-Bernard Nadeau

The wines they produce are defined by their perfume. Tasted young they smell of dark fruits and violets, but with bottle age of 10 years or more they evolve to encompass notes of cedarwood, vanilla, sometimes mushroom and earth. While texturally they are featherweight, they retain their power, revealing a lingering intensity of flavor. They also come with an eye-watering price tag. The 2000 grand vin may set you back a mere £565 (€680) a bottle, but last year in Dubai a limited edition Balthazar (12-liter bottle) of the 2009 vintage went on sale for £122,380 (€148,000).

Given its relative scarcity—only around 150,000 bottles are produced each year— what makes Château Margaux so important? In a word: influence. The red wines of Bordeaux have inspired winemakers around the world. To understand the heights that a Cabernet Sauvignon-based blend can attain, one must look to Bordeaux's five first growths, and Château Margaux is one of the best.


1982 A defining vintage in Bordeaux

2000 Drinking beautifully just now, an exquisite wine

2009 Picked out by Mr. Pontallier as one of his best vintages

2010 Often overlooked, but in many ways promises even more staying power than 2009

It is also the first growth I am most familiar with. I have driven up that long, tree-lined drive to the château several times, walked among its vineyards and talked with the owner and winemaker. I have also tasted a good range of its wines, both young (from the barrel) and old, many in the company of its wine director, Paul Pontallier. Most recently, during a visit he made to London, I had an opportunity to taste a number of vintages stretching back to the 1960s. What struck me particularly was the overall improvement in style.

The '66, from a year with an exceptionally hot summer, has become almost ethereal, a lightly textured wine whose bright acidity gives it a natural lift. But it's also very savory with mature aromas of ground coffee, tobacco, cedarwood and graphite.

The '82, a defining vintage in Bordeaux, has a level of ripeness, says Mr. Pontallier, not seen since the early 1960s. It's a powerful wine with a full-bodied, dense feel. The nose is gloriously floral, with rich, sweet red fruit and a slightly earthy character.

The '86 is a wine made in the traditional style, Mr. Pontallier says. I found it still a little tight and dense. It improved in the glass but could do with more bottle age.

Margaux du Château Margaux 2009 was the first release of the estate's third wine. Château Margaux

Without question, the star of the show was the 2000, an exquisite wine with a charming, complex nose that is heavily floral, underpinned by crushed rock and red fruit. Once sipped, it is very smooth, with hardly any bitter flavors at all.

Four very different wines, but with an over-arching "house style". So where does that come from? Is it the grape varieties? (A typical blend is 80% Cabernet Sauvignon and 10% Merlot, with the rest being made up of Petit Verdot and Cabernet Franc.) Is it the barrels for ageing, or the style of winemaking? All three of these, partly. But for Mr. Pontallier what matters most is terroir, the gifts of geography: well-drained gravelly soils, which often favour exceptional wines; the Gironde estuary nearby, keeping temperatures moderate, with less chance of frost or heat-spikes; an Atlantic climate overall, with warm summers and mild winters.

For those who would like to taste the outcome of this perfect combination of conditions—but whose wallets don't stretch to £500 a bottle—now there is good news. Because of its costliness, the grand vin is no longer seen on many wine lists, so the château has introduced a third wine, Margaux du Château Margaux, tailored specifically for restaurants. With a modest £30 price tag, it puts the product of a great château within reach of the majority of wine drinkers.

The Château Through History

Early Years

Known as the "La Mothe de Margaux" (the Margaux mound), the vineyards weren't properly organized until the arrival of the Lestonnac family in the 16th century. They converted much of the land from cereal farming to vineyards.

17th and 18th Centuries

By the end of the 17th century, vineyards at Château Margaux had been successfully cultivated by the Lestonnac, Pontac and the d'Aulèdes families. Of the estate's 265 hectares, roughly a third was under vine, and its reputation had already crossed the Atlantic: Thomas Jefferson bought some of its wine in 1784.


Bertrand Douat, the Marquis de la Colonilla Château Margaux

The château was confiscated by the state after its owner, Elie du Barry, was guillotined in the Reign of Terror. The last descendant of the Lestonnac family, Laure de Fumel, managed to buy it back but it proved too much for her and in 1802 she sold it to Bertrand Douat, Marquis de la Colonilla, a Basque who built the house we know today, and the cellars and cooperage.


Architect Louis Combes completed the neo-Palladian mansion—and created one of the most famous images in Bordeaux.


Château Margaux was officially designated a "Premier Grand Cru Classé", or first growth, in the new classification drawn up by the brokers of Bordeaux, to highlight the region's best wines at the Paris Exposition.


Pierre Ginestet Château Margaux

After two world wars, depression and the threat of vine disease such as powdery mildew, the château was sold to the Ginestet family, who had had a controlling shareholding since the 1920s. The father-and-son team set about reorganizing the vineyards and building a separate trading business. Eventually the recessions of the early 1970s prompted them to sell up.


A disastrous harvest led to the decision to make no Château Margaux.

1977 – The Mentzelopoulos Era

Greek-born entrepreneur André Mentzelopoulos, acquired the property from the Ginestets and set about overhauling the vineyards and the cellars.


Corinne and André Mentzelopoulos in 1980 Château Margaux

Aged just 27, Corinne Mentzelopoulos was placed in charge of the château after the sudden death of her father, André. She hired a young and relatively unknown viticulturalist named Paul Pontallier, who had studied at the University of Montpellier.


A Balthazar (12-liter bottle) of this vintage, one of only six made, currently claims the record as the world's most expensive bottle of red wine.


One of the most difficult growing seasons on record is likely to see a huge reduction in quantities as meticulous selection in the vineyard was required to weed out poor grapes.

Write to Will Lyons at