Terroir Insight: Domaine Tawse Musigny

The prices on top vineyards in Burgundy have reached astronomic levels, and this means that the plots on the top vineyards rarely are traded these days.

The ownership structure is somewhat stuck in the old patterns .. with little or no possibility to acquire plots on the big grand crus for talented younger producers – unless they have a serious financial backup. This construction can be a fine marriage between talent and money and often resulting in better wine.

The cooperation between Moray Tawse and Pascal Marchand is however more than this, as Moray Tawse seems more directly involved than just being a vineyard investor. With his passion and the fine talent of the wine making team headed by Pascal Marchand and Mark Fincham they are really striving for the top shelf quality wise.

I cant say I’m an expert in the wines from Marchand-Tawse or Domaine Tawse for that matter… but from what I have tasted true talent is at play here – these are pure and refined wines with a lovely drinkability … in other words the kind of Burgundies I like.

It’s therefore great when people like Moray Tawse take over plots on the best vineyards – instead of some big corporation trying to make a profile in Burgundy.

The top wine of the Marchand-Tawse estate or should I say estates is the Musigny … so lets take a closer look at the Tawse plots in the Musigny vineyard.

Musigny – one vineyard three sections

The Musigny Grand Cru has three main sections – from the north Les Musigny or Grands Musigny – the main section. South of Les Musigny we find Les Petits Musigny – a de Vogüé monopole, and lastly we have a “recent” addition to the Musigny vineyard comprising of some plots in the climate La Combe d’Orveau (added to Musigny in 1929 and 1989) – see map below.

Tawse Musigny .. the plots

The Domaine Tawse Musigny now comes from two small plots located in the bottom of the Musigny vineyard – below the road.

The two plots are a part of Les Musigny (the northern part of Musigny) and they are the only wine producing plots located below the road – see map below.

There are in total four plots of Les Musigny located below the road going from Chateau Clos de Vougeot towards Chambolle Musigny.

Only two of these cadastre plots are planted with vines, the other plots are very small and presumably not suitable for producing wine.

The map below show the two Tawse plots. The largest plot – 0.0760 ha (cadastre no 19 on the map) was acquired from Domaine Christian Confuron in Vougeot presumably in 2013.

The other Domaine Tawse plot (20) .. is only 156 square meters and was acquired from André Porcheret of Monthelie-Douhairet-Porchere in 2014.

Domaine Tawse is the smallest owner on Musigny with in total 0.0916 ha, only marginally smaller than Domaine Georges Roumier who owns 0.0966 ha. Actually only two producers own more than one ha of Musigny – that’s Domaine J.F. Mugnier (1.1358 ha) and the dominant owner Domaine Comte Georges de Vogüé with 7.1208 ha.