Bordeaux — Kwame Granderson Photography

No. 01 · Chapter VI · France

Lynch-Bages

Château Lynch-Bages · Pauillac · 5ème Cru Classé · 1855

Built by Thomas Lynch — an Irishman whose family fled to Bordeaux in the early eighteenth century — and inherited by his nephew Michel in 1779. Sold to the Cazes family in 1934, who have been making the wine ever since; the current generation, with the architect Chien Chung Pei (son of I.M. Pei), finished a complete renovation of the chai in 2020. The clock tower beside the chartreuse has kept Pauillac time since 1850. The reflecting pool was a Cazes idea. — Photographer's Note

"Wine is the most civilized thing in the world."

— Ernest Hemingway · Death in the Afternoon · 1932

Thu 3 Jul 2025 · 16:46 · Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max · Main Camera · 6.8mm · f/1.78 · 1/1520s · ISO 80

Château Lynch-Bages · Pauillac · Médoc 45.2153° N · 0.7491° W

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Aerial view from the clock tower of Château Lynch-Bages, showing the formal gardens, the new winery building, and vineyards extending to a stormy horizon

No. 02 · Chapter VI · France

The Domain

From the clock tower · looking south over the estate

Five-thirty in the afternoon. Up on the platform of the clock tower, where the bell still rings the hours by mechanical hand. To the right, the new chai à barriques — eight thousand square metres of poured concrete designed to make wine and host a Michelin-starred restaurant in the same building. Beyond the gardens, the hundred-hectare estate stretches to the Gironde, with a Pauillac thunderstorm coming in from the west — exactly on time, like everything else here. — Photographer's Note

"Le vin est tout simplement la chimie de l'âme."
Wine is simply the chemistry of the soul.

— Émile Peynaud · the father of modern Bordeaux winemaking

Thu 3 Jul 2025 · 17:28 · Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max · Main Camera · 6.8mm · f/1.78 · 1/1520s · ISO 100

Château Lynch-Bages · Pauillac · Médoc 45.2153° N · 0.7491° W

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A dirt path between rows of Cabernet Sauvignon vines in the Médoc, extending to a flat horizon under a hazy sky

No. 03 · Chapter VI · France

Between the Rows

The vineyards · Pauillac

Five-thirty-three, five minutes after the last frame. A path runs straight from the chai out into the parcels. What's growing on both sides is mostly Cabernet Sauvignon, with some Merlot, a thin braid of Cabernet Franc, a row or two of Petit Verdot. The soil underneath is gravel left by the Garonne fifty thousand years ago — the very gravel the river forgot to take with it when it changed course. Pauillac calls this "croupes graveleuses." Other people call it the most expensive dirt on earth. — Photographer's Note

"The reason for the vine is not the bottle.
The reason for the vine is to express the land."

— Hugh Johnson · The World Atlas of Wine

Thu 3 Jul 2025 · 17:33 · Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max · Main Camera · 6.8mm · f/1.78 · 1/2370s · ISO 80

Lynch-Bages vineyards · Pauillac 45.2153° N · 0.7491° W

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The new chai à barriques at Château Lynch-Bages — long rows of new French oak barrels with red wine staining on the heads, on a checkerboard tile floor under a vaulted ceiling

No. 04 · Chapter VI · France

Le Chai

The new barrel hall · Lynch-Bages · 18 months in French oak

Seven in the evening. The new chai à barriques is two storeys underground — Chien Chung Pei put it there so the temperature would stay close to 14°C without help, and so the floor above could be used for something else. The barrels are bordelaises — 225 litres each, made from French oak grown in the forests of Allier and Tronçais, toasted by hand for ninety seconds. About a third of them are new each year. The wine will rest here for eighteen months before bottling. The red rings on the heads are the only thing in the room that hasn't been engineered. — Photographer's Note

"Wine is bottled poetry."

— Robert Louis Stevenson · Across the Plains · 1892

Thu 3 Jul 2025 · 19:09 · Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max · Main Camera · 6.8mm · f/1.78 · 1/50s · ISO 160

Chai à barriques · Lynch-Bages · Pauillac 45.2153° N · 0.7491° W

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