Chateau Ste Roseline (Cotes de Provence)

Sainte Roseline. The vineyards in the background The Chateau Sainte Roseline is a Cotes de Provence winery which is located close to Les Arcs, a small town in inner Var (Departement), in Provence, near the Nationale 7 highway . To reach it, you need to take the small D 91 road eastward from Les Arcs , and you can actually spot Sainte Roseline on the map (a few centimeters on the right of Les Arcs). A visit to the Chateau Sainte Roseline has a double interest : The estate is a big, well-knowned Cotes de Provence wine producer whose wines are appreciated and exported , and it is also a historic site : It was formerly, before the French Revoltution, an Abbey, the Abbaye de la Celle-Roubaud. Right near the winery is the chapel: This roman chapel which was built in the 12th century is of major interest . It holds unique religious Art [see on left , angel and grapes, and the lower pic] , and the body of Sainte Roseline, conserved for centuries under a glass case [see picture at the bottom]. Pilgrims come from all over France and Europe to pay tribute to her spiritual work. It is also home to a mural work by Chagall.
Sainte Roseline was of a high birth , born january 27th 1263 the oldest daughter of Arnaud de Villeneuve and Sybille de Sabran in the Chateau of Les Arcs. She devoted all her life to help the poor. She died january 17th 1329 at the age of 66 and was buried in plain ground. Her body was exhumed five years later and happened to be perfectly conserved with her eyes open and with a clear, generous expression. This was deemed amiracle and with all her life devoted to help the poor, she was declared a saint. Her body was subsequently exposed to the faith of the pilgrims, who came from afar to pray near her remains. You can see clearly her face, hands, and bare feet on the picture.
This is a well organized estate, and visitors can have a tour in french & english at the same time , which begins with the chapel and follows with the wine production facilities and the cellars, ending with the sampling of several wines the tasting room and wine shop. The visit with tasting costs 4 Euro altogether. The Foudres (big casks) roomThe chapel can be accessed for free though , if you want to skip the rest of the program .
We follow our guide with a dozen tourists from France and northern Europe . In the chapel first . Beautiful religious art . Also a mosaic by Marc Chagall (1975), which is there due to the help of the Maeght family to restore this chapel . Pilgrims come continuously to the chapel , but the major pilgrimage takes place on january 17th (Sainte Roseline day in the calendar) . Now the wine production facilities : The Chateau is one of the 18 "crus classes" of the Provence wine regions and appellations , in wich about 700 Domaines & Chateaux are listed .Our guide shows us the harvest room where air-con trucks bring the grapes that are then processed vertically to 2 lower levels . This room being basically of practical use only at harvest time , it is now rented for weddings , seminars , concerts (up to 500 people)... We now go to the lower levels . The Chateau invested heavily in state of the art technology , and quite everything around has been bought in the last 10 years . The vineyards surface has jumped from 50 hectares a few years ago to 110 hectares today, also partly resulting from higher vine concentration per hectare . In the lower levels under the harvest room , many different sizes of stainless steel vats with different functions . The picture upper right shows vats holding 3 separate containers vertically each . On one of them , respective volumes were marked as 170 , 105 , 100 hectoliters .

123 hectoliter vats60 hectoliters debourbage vats are used , with regulated temperature . After 15 days , the deposit from must goes down and the clear juice is separated . Then , yeasts are added , as well as SO2 , and it goes for a 15 days fermentation phase . . It will stay 4/5 months in 123 hectoliter stainless steel vats in an adjacent room ( see picture ) .
Now the cellars . Different rooms , many casks . Selected casks from Seguin-Moreau , Boutes , Mercier , Dargoud , wich are changed after 3 years . Two big cellar rooms with many casks and foudres . The one for the reds is said to hold 23 foudres and 250 casks . The other cellar , for the whites and rose wines , holds 200 casks . Full capacity of these two cellars is equivalent to 240 000 bottles . If I remberer correctly , we visited also a cellar of "Cuvee Prestige" wines with many casks , and this cellar was even colder than the other ones .
We then went to the tasting room :
__1__ Chateau Sainte Roseline Cotes de Provence cru classe 2003 white . Rolle , Semillon , Clairette . 10,9 Euro .
__2__ Chateau Sainte Roseline Cotes de Provence cru classe white "Cuvee Prieure" 2003 . Rolle & Semillon . Woody . 14,2 Euro .
__3__ Chateau Sainte Roseline Cotes de Provence cru classe 2003 rose "Cuvee Lampe de Meduse" Named because of the special bottle shape . Grenache, Cinsault, Tibouren, Mourvedre . 13,65 Euro .
__5__ Chateau Sainte Roseline Cotes de Provence cru classe red 2003 . Cabernet Sauvignon , Grenache , Mourvedre . 12,75 Euro .
__6__ Chateau Sainte Roseline Cotes de Provence cru classe red 2002 "Cuvee Prieure" 70% Syrah, plus Cinsault and a little of Mourvedre . 13,5° . Good potential with some more years . Already very good . 16,9 Euro .The Altar and its Extraordinary Baroque RetableThe Abbaye de la Celle-Roubaud, where the Sainte Roseline winery sits, was closed well before the French Revolution, in 1750, at a time when ideas hostile for the religious tradition (Rousseau and Voltaire) were spreading. It was seized during the french revolution but escaped from destruction.Marc Chagall's mosaicChagall's Mosaic represents "the Meal served by Angels". The monumental work of Art was made in 1975. Chateau Sainte Roseline83460 Les Arcs Sur Argensphone +33 4 94 99 50 30fax +33 4 94 47 53 06contact@sainte-roseline.comSainteroseline.comThe Body of Sainte Roseline, lying in the Chapel

Comments

[Caroline Brown]

I would like to know if there is a distributor in the UK and also if there is a minimum order requirement?

I visited the chateau last week and highly recommend a visit!

i found a bottle of vin rose chateau S. roseline from france 1959 so you think it's still good?

[Leigh Harris]

We visited the winery in Sept. 2007, and were delighted to watch the grapes being picked. We were not able to visit the chapel but hope to return some day. Do you have a distributor in the USA that we can contact? We live in Tenneessee and cannot have wine shipped directly to us. We would like to find the nearest retail store that carries your wine. We brought back a bottle of your red cuvee prieure, cru classe and loved it!

[sharon schlachter]

I was recently given a bottle of 1957 Lampe de meduse, can you tell me the value and if it is still good?

[Mark Lindsley]

e visitedd in Septrember 2008 and enjoyed the wine. Can't seem to find it in the USA. Is there a US distributor?

[Cindy]

I was reading some of the comments because I have a beautiful bottle of Vin Rose Chateau Ste. Roseline from 1957 - the wine looks terrible but the bottle and tag are very interesting. Is there some value or should I just keep the bottle for a vase? HA!

Thanks!