Domaine E. Guigal

The house of E.GUIGAL was founded in 1946 by Etienne Guigal at Ampuis, just to the south and across the Rhône from the famous roman city of Vienne. Ampuis is at the center of the appelation of Côte-Rôtie where the Syrah grape shows at its finest. The steep hillside of Ampuis has been producing wine from its terraces for at least 2400 years, a fact that the coins found in the vines prove. Etienne Guigal came as a cellarman and vigneron to the house of Vidal-Fleury, the oldest in the Rhône, being founded in 1781, at the age of 14 in 1923. In all he was to be involved in 67 vintages of Côte-Rôtie between Vidal-Fleury and Guigal, and his crowning achievement was to buy in 1984 the house of Vidal-Fleury where he has begun. Vidal-Fleury still operates independently of the house of Guigal.

Almost as young as when his father began, Marcel Guigal joined his father, who had suddenly become blind in 1961, and together they worked to make E.GUIGAL the fine house that it is today. Philippe, the son of Marcel and Bernadette, is following in the family tradition. He finished his studies at the Oenological University in Dijon, specialising in vineyards and then graduated from the International Organisation of the Wine in Paris as a Matser of Science in Wine Management..