Laurent Calmel and Jérôme Joseph, or Calmel & Joseph (also called C & J) are two French friends who became famous for their wines. Special detail: they make these mainly from grapes sourced from very carefully selected pieces of vineyard from other winemakers.
Text: Petri Houweling | Image: Calmel & Joseph
They do so in the highly versatile Languedoc wine region in the south of France. The region consists of four departments, namely Gard, Hérault, Aude and Pyrénées-Orientales. Around 240,000 ha of vineyards are planted in the total region, spread across 36 different AOPs. It is a hugely varied area with many different terroirs. The grapes are planted from close to the coast to the mountains. The dry and hot wine region suffers from climate changes, but is adapting by increasingly working organically and using other grape varieties (see box).
Win-win situation
Négociant-éleveur, which is the fancy French term for someone who makes wine from other people's grapes. They do so because these come from the best vineyards. These are selected based on the location and composition of the soil, which are two flavour determinants of the final wines. It is a win-win situation because they pay the owner more for the grapes than a cooperative would.
Combination of talents
Jérôme Joseph is originally a wine merchant and Laurent Calmel is an executive oenologist. They met during a project and recognised in each other the passion to make typical, authentic and affordable Languedoc wines. In 1995, they founded Calmel & Joseph and currently work with 65 different Languedoc winemakers.
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