When the first light of morning slides across the steep flanks of Chavignol’s Monts Damnés, a thin veil of mist settles over one of the Loire Valley’s most mythical plots of land. It is here, on just a single hectare of fossil-studded limestone, that the wines of Domaine Edmond & Anne Vatan are born — wines that have become almost mythical themselves. Their flagship, the monopole Clos la Néore, is not just the identity of the domaine; it is its heartbeat, its heritage, its entire philosophy expressed through one vineyard.
A Legacy Written in Limestone
The Vatan story is one of precision and patience rather than scale. For decades, Edmond Vatan quietly shaped a reputation that reached far beyond the modest size of his estate. He farmed with discipline, harvested with intuition, and vinified with almost monastic restraint. Eventually, the torch passed to his daughter, Anne Vatan-Foucault, who arrived with an archaeologist’s sensitivity to history and context. When she took over in 2008, she inherited not only vines, but a responsibility to continue the family’s uncompromising vision.
Edmond gradually slimmed down his original holdings, keeping only the parcel he believed held the truest expression of Chavignol’s soul. That parcel — Clos la Néore — became the estate’s sole focus. With Anne’s stewardship, the domaine has continued to operate on a scale closer to artistry than to agriculture.
The People Behind the Purity
Edmond remains an iconic, almost mythical presence in Sancerre — gentle, thoughtful, and fiercely devoted to authenticity. But the daily pulse of the domaine is now Anne’s. Every winter she prunes ruthlessly to limit yields, ensuring the vines put their energy toward concentration rather than volume. She harvests later than many around her, waiting for fruit that is ripe yet still electric with acidity.
In the cellar, she is guided by the same philosophy that defined her father’s work: no shortcuts, no corrections, no modern trickery. Fermentation relies solely on indigenous yeasts. The wine ages slowly in old, neutral barrels that add no flavour of their own. Racking is minimal. Bottling proceeds without fining or filtration. The aim is not to sculpt the wine but to allow it to reveal itself as it chooses.
Terroir: The Voice of Monts Damnés
The Monts Damnés slope is one of the most dramatic and revered terroirs in Sancerre. Clos la Néore lies on its upper reaches, where the angle of the hillside is so steep it seems determined to slide into the village below. The soil is composed almost entirely of Kimmeridgian limestone — ancient, chalky, layered with fossilised shells that lend a salty whisper to the wines.
The vineyard faces south, soaking up sunlight during the day yet cooling swiftly at night. This interplay of warmth and chill extends the ripening season, allowing the grapes to develop rich aromatics while preserving the piercing acidity that defines the great whites of Chavignol. The roots of the forty-year-old vines dig deep into limestone banks, pulling up minerals that seem to translate directly into the wine’s crystalline core.
The Wines: Clos la Néore, and the Ghosts of Wines Past
Clos la Néore – The Singular Masterpiece
This is the wine that made the domaine legendary. Pure Sauvignon Blanc, harvested by hand and made with absolute minimal intervention, Clos la Néore is released in tiny quantities — often around four thousand bottles per year. That scarcity, however, is merely a footnote to its true power. What matters is what’s inside the bottle.
The nose is delicate and tightly coiled, revealing layers over time: lemon balm, citrus zest, white flowers, fresh herbs, and the unmistakable scent of crushed chalk. On the palate, the wine is vividly linear — a blade of acidity, a sheath of texture, a resonance of limestone that seems to shimmer long after the wine has gone. As it ages, Clos la Néore takes on notes of beeswax, lanolin, smoke, and green tea, but the mineral backbone remains unshakeable.
Some recent vintages have been bottled in magnum, a format that further enhances its ageability and sense of monumentality.
Sancerre Blanc – A Historical Footnote
In the distant past, before Edmond narrowed his vision to Clos la Néore alone, he produced a broader Sancerre Blanc cuvée sourced from his other parcels. These wines were known for their clarity and finesse, but as Edmond honed his focus, he relinquished those vines. They now survive only in the recollections of collectors who tasted the domaine before its distillation to a single cuvée.
Sancerre Rouge – The Rarest of Shadows
A small amount of red wine from Pinot Noir was once produced by the Vatan family. Though never widely exported or formally promoted, it existed, and a few bottles occasionally surface in auction catalogues or old private cellars. Today, the domaine no longer produces Sancerre Rouge, but its faint legacy remains part of the Vatan story, a reminder of a time when the domaine was more diversified, however modestly.
And That Is All — Intentionally So
In a region where most domaines craft half a dozen wines or more, the Vatan family’s decision to make only one wine stands out as both bold and deeply rooted. It is not an accident. It is a philosophy: clarity through focus, depth through devotion, excellence through singularity.
Why the Wines Endure in the Imagination
Domaine Edmond & Anne Vatan captivates precisely because it resists the modern pressures of expansion and polish. Here, a single hectare receives the full attention of a family who has never sought to grow, only to deepen. Their wines, especially Clos la Néore, feel like a dialogue between soil and time — intimate, unhurried, and profoundly place-driven.
For sommeliers, producers, and wine lovers seeking wines of transparency and longevity, the Vatan wines offer something rare: purity without pretence. A glass of Clos la Néore is less a tasting than a moment of clarity — a reminder of what can be achieved when a winegrower listens to nature rather than instructing it.
