Jean-Luc Colombo Reaching for New Heights in France’s Rhône Valley
Jean-Luc Colombo’s passion for “les plaisirs de table” — instilled by his mother and grandmother — has always guided him. Further inspired by his love for Rhône Valley wines, he pivoted away from a successful career as a pharmacist and moved to Cornas to become an enologist in the early 1980s. Armed with an impressive knowledge of chemistry, he consulted for estates across France’s Rhône Valley, quickly earning a reputation for the high-quality wines he helped produce.
While Jean-Luc still consults for upwards of 30 wineries, his greatest contribution to the wine world is the exceptional wines he crafts alongside his wife, Anne, and daughter, Laure. The Colombo winery lies in Cornas, a tiny appellation in the Northern Rhône and one of the most important appellations for syrah. (In fact, it’s the only Rhône region in which syrah is the single permitted grape variety.) The Colombos have gained international recognition for bringing modern viticultural practices to Cornas and for crafting a beautifully concentrated, balanced, and fresh style of syrah.
From the beginning, Jean-Luc and Anne have been committed to sustainable farming in their vineyards, achieving organic certification from Ecocert in 2016. Anne is especially passionate about the land — she tends their vineyards and spearheads the family’s “Bee Helpful” initiative, which helps fund research into restoring healthy bee colonies. Anne has served as President of the AOC Cornas Syndicate, during which time she mapped the region’s iconic slopes in great detail. In the cellar, Jean-Luc was the first winemaker in Cornas to introduce cold soaking and aging in new oak barrels. For these, and their many other, contributions to the wine industry, Anne and Jean-Luc were each awarded the French Legion of Honor, France’s highest civilian award.
Following in her parents’ footsteps, Laure has embraced all aspects of the wine industry, earning master’s degrees in oenology and business. She started in marketing, working for prestigious estates like Champagne’s Dom Pérignon, before training in winemaking at Château Haut-Brion, one of Bordeaux’s illustrious Premier Grand Cru Classé estates. Today, Laure is head winemaker at her family’s winery, where she’s poised to continue her parents’ mission to promote phenomenal Cornas wines to a new generation.
Terroir
While Jean-Luc Colombo consults for wineries across the Rhône Valley, he chose to establish his own estate in Cornas. Located at the southern end of the Northern Rhône, Cornas is among the valley’s smallest appellations — only two miles wide with roughly 130 hectares/325 acres under vine. Like most Rhône Valley vineyards, Cornas benefits from a Mediterranean climate, with warm summers that yield concentrated syrah grapes.
Cornas’ vineyards sit on steep, south-facing slopes that rise from the Rhône River. Often called a natural amphitheater, this landscape shelters vines from the harsh Mistral wind. The high elevation (up to 350 meters/1,150 feet) provides ample sunshine to ripen syrah grapes, along with cool temperatures that preserve freshness. Free-draining, decomposed granite soils stress the vines, encouraging the syrah to develop greater complexity, and impart a distinctive minerality to the wines. Together, these conditions give Cornas syrah its uniquely vibrant, complex character.
Viticulture
The quality that characterizes Jean-Luc Colombo wines originates in the vineyards. While the Colombos own property throughout southern France, they’re best known for bringing modern viticultural practices to Cornas. They grow only syrah, marsanne, and roussanne in their organic vineyards, which are certified by Ecocert. The family practices dry farming, which forces vines to root deep through multiple layers of nutrients in the soil, keeps yields low, and allows for the purest expression of each vintage.
Although they give equal care to all their properties, the Colombos’ signature vineyard is Les Ruchets (“the beehive”), named for the bees that inhabit it. This special site is part of the larger Chaillot vineyard, recognized as one of Cornas’ best growing areas. Les Ruchets contains “francs de pieds” (“true vines”) that are roughly 90 years old, un-grafted, and grow on their natural rootstocks, a serious rarity in the post-phylloxera world. The syrah wines produced by these vines are beautifully concentrated and expressive.
Colombo Winery Winemaking Practices
The Colombo family has revolutionized winemaking in Cornas, introducing a modern, balanced style of wine. They de-stem the grapes before crushing to prevent harsh tannins, then cold soak them to enhance aromas. Fermentation in stainless steel tanks preserves syrah’s freshness and primary fruit flavors. Most notably, the Colombos were the first in Cornas to age syrah in new oak barrels, instead of traditional large foudres, which imparts a delicious complexity to Colombo wines.
