Le Raisin et l’Ange
Gilles Azzoni moved to Ardèche in the early 1980s to make wine, starting out with a small rented farm where he planted Grenache, Syrah, and Viognier. By the early ‘90s he was only spraying Bordeaux mixture on his vines, and by 1997 he was farming organically. Around this time he tasted a revelatory wine (depending on whose account you follow, this wine was a magnum of 1996 Dard & Ribo Crozes-Hermitage, one of Christian Chaussard’s first bottlings in 1997, a wine from Domaine Marcel Lapierre, or some combination of the three), and was inspired to fully embrace the style.
Azzoni’s first fully natural vintage was 2000, a year in which his wines were first officially certified organic, and in which he used no sulfur, yeast, or filtration. Ever since, the wines of Le Raisin et l’Ange have been organically farmed, hand-picked, and made with zero sulfur. 25 years later, Gilles is the godfather of natural winemaking in Ardèche, and Le Raisin et l’Ange remains a standard-bearer for the region.
In 2014, Gilles’s son Antonin took over the small farm and most of the winemaking. Today, most of their fruit is négociant fruit, through which he supports the spread of organic faming among the region’s various growing cooperatives.
These are vibrant, special wines made with two generations’ experience in natural winemaking. We’re so excited to share them with you!