Camille Braun

Camille Braun

by Sam Olive

Camille Braun founded the estate in the southern village of Orschwihr, Alsace France in the 1960s with 5 hectares of vineyards planted in and around the village. The fruit was always hand harvested and fermented in his cellar in the village, and his simple, delicate approach to winemaking suited the warmer, limestone rich soils his vines were planted on. His son, Christophe took the reins in the late 80’s taking the step to turn al his vineyards over to biodynamic viticulture. He also bought carefully chosen parcels including vines in the Grand Cru of Pfingstberg a village slope of 350m, with a south east facing slope, soil of limestone and sandstone; -Lippelsberg: at the bottom of the Pfingstberg, limestone and clay soil; and Kaefferkopf planted in 2006, around the village of Ammerschwihr and granitic soil with different expositions. They also have a small parcel in Bollenberg, a small hill separated from the Vosges mountains, which has an amazing, and rare, amalgamation of different soils and substrata (a clay-limestone hill and on the top some hand pebbles and sand) and is worked by horse only.

[more]The number of wines produced almost represent each parcel (over 30 covering 15 hectares) and we will be starting with just a handful which we feel show off the wonderful expression of fruit and quality of winemaking as much as the terroir. We will introduce more of the wines over the course of 2019, including the sweet wines and Grand Cru. The Edelzwicker is a blend of virtually all the varieties but principally Pinot Blanc and Sylvaner. Tschaumer is a parcel selected wine located on limestone with some light clay soil. Effenberg is also a parcel selected wine from clay and limestone soil, and from old vines. Uffholz is a parcel selection of the village in which most of their Pinot Gris vines lie.[/more]