Domaine Face_B

Fet bé (Catalan).

Fait bien (French).

Do good.  Does good.  Does well.  Does much.

For Séverin Barioz & Mathilde Ceccon it means the realisation of a 2^nd life through perseverance.  And perseverance is paying off, with beautiful wines produced alongside the tribe of world-class winemakers in&around a small village of 220 people.

Calce is famous for its tectonic marvel of striated bedrock – a playground for soil geeks and biodynamic seekers. Vines are pinstriped along limestone, clay, marl, and granite striations, allowing for controlled fermentations and blends that put the prowess of a winemaker centre-stage. 

Their neighbours Jean-Philippe Padié, Olivier Pithon and Wilfried Valet have built a culture of natural winemaking in Calce.  Their wines are first class, always clean and elegant.  It is a ‘call of the wild’ for principled winemakers. 

Jancis Robinson christened Macabeu the Cinderella grape.  Three of Face-B’s wines –  Makéba, 2 of us 2022, 3 little birds – will get this Catalan native grape an invitation to the ball.  Stony orchard fruits, oodles of freshness, firm acidity, little salinity.  Beautiful.  This grape – which flourishes in dry, hot, blustery conditions – is becoming a rite of passage in Calce with Willfried’s Neo Nervis and Pithon’s Maccabeu being world-class examples.

They organically farm 8 hectares of vines  according to biodynamic principles. All the work of the vine is done by hand. Only tillage and certain treatments are carried out mechanically.

In the cellar, the grapes are vinified independently for each plot, without inputs (native yeasts, no or very little addition of sulphites).  No bonding, no filtration.

They make 7 whites and 3 reds, we think!  For whites, alcoholic and malolactic fermentations are carried out in 228 litres stainless steel tanks. The reds are vinified in concrete tanks, using fire-mill method (deleased layer, then unspreaded layer), and/or infusion (whole and direct pressing clusters). Short dining (between 6 and 15 days), then sing a half-muid (600 litres-7 wines) and concrete vats.