A family story
René Carayol, a Protestant industrialist from Mazamet, is looking for a peaceful haven where he can bring his family together for summer vacations. He fell under the spell of Domaine de Cabrol. At the time, the estate was oriented towards mixed farming, although vines were in the majority and wine was already being made on the estate. René further developed the cultivation of vines and fruit trees (apricot, almond).
1990…
His son Claude takes over the estate. After a revolutionary youth as a student and a career as a teacher, he made wine the great passion of the second half of his life. Under his impetus, the estate became a benchmark in Languedoc winegrowing and the flagship of the Cabardès appellation. He reorganized the grape varieties, created new plots and devoted all his energy, tenacity and intelligence to understanding and revealing this unique terroir. With his brother Alain, he also developed olive growing.
SINCE 2021
His son Nicolas, a university professor, is now carrying on the work with passion and loyalty to family values: closeness to nature, minimization of inputs, intellectual rigor, and expression of terroir. He is responsible for major ongoing projects to reorganize the winery and share the “Cabrol experience”.
A STORY OF NATURE
The Domaine de Cabrol is located north of Carcassonne, on the southern slopes of the Montagne Noire, on a balcony above a valley where the Mediterranean (east winds) and Atlantic (west winds) climates communicate. It boasts a particularly rich biodiversity, with wildlife evolving in a landscape shaped by garrigue and woodland, where vines stand side by side with holm oaks, pines, olive trees, almond trees and wild thyme Raised in this raw environment, the estate’s vines grow on hillsides and natural clay-limestone terraces at an altitude of 350 meters. Essential to our terroir, altitude brings freshness to our grapes and contributes to the elegance of our wines.
A STORY OF STYLE
Our work in the cellar aims to express this unique Languedoc terroir, its energy, density, typicity and great freshness. It is based on simple, respectful gravity-fed methods, thanks to a cellar ideally suited to the slope of the mountain.
We have opted for long, gentle, controlled maceration, with no wood ageing. The complexity of our wines comes from the blending of parcel selections, rather than from “pseudo-expert winemaking” that too often standardizes flavors. Ongoing investments in the cellar will further improve the precision of our wines, without ever masking them with artifice.