Nicole Levet’s grandfather first purchased vineyards in Ampuis in 1936 and began making wine immediately thereafter. Initially, he delivered his Cote Rotie in barrels to the city of St. Etienne where he sold it to bistros and cafes. In 1966, Nicole’s father, Marius Chambeyron, began to bottle a small portion of the production of the estate. Fortunately, Nicole and her husband Bernard Levet, were prepared to continue Chambeyron’s life’s work. It was with the formidable 1983 vintage that Bernard Levet took over the wine production as well as the management of the vineyard with Nicole.

The Domaine’s current total production is approximately 1000 cases annually and is exclusively of the appellation of Cote Rotie. The domaine consists of 3.5 hectares of vineyards, all of which are located within the boundaries of the town of Ampuis. The vineyards are all steeply terraced and must be worked and harvested manually.

The grapes are generally not destemmed before passing through a pneumatic press. The primary fermentation takes place in epoxy lined cuves. There is a long maceration and the cuvaison lasts three weeks. The wine is then racked into large oak barrels where it spends the remainder of its first year. At the beginning of the second year, the wines are racked into medium-sized barrels (“demi-muid”). In the third year, the wines are racked again and left to complete the barrel aging in a mixture of “demi-muid” and small barrels. The wines are bottled after three years of barrel aging with a light fining and no filtration.