Château La Lagune: Albert Galy
Louis Sèze had married Françoise Plantey (born 1859) and they had one daughter, Marie Marguerite (1889 – 1972) and she had married Albert Galy (1881 – 1933), who hailed from Lyon, on the banks of the Rhône. After the passing of Louis in 1911 the responsibility for the running of the property then passed to his son-in-law Albert. He expanded production, and by 1922 was noted to be turning out 90 tonneaux per annum. After his death in 1933, however, it was his widow Marguerite who took up the mantle. By this time the property, now named Château Grand La Lagune, was already beginning a spiralling deterioration, as were many others in Bordeaux. The vineyard covered at least 50 hectares at the turn of the century, but as the decades went by this figure dwindled; there were just 40 hectares in 1923, 35 hectares in 1935, 9.5 hectares in 1949 and by 1954 the vineyard was nearly extinct, with just 4 hectares of vines.
Georges Brunet
It is here, at the darkest moment for the property, that Château La Lagune’s modern revival began. The château and vineyards were purchased in 1958 by Georges Brunet, an agricultural engineer, who restored the estate to what it had been during the Piston-d’Eaubonne-Jouffrey era with the purchase of Petit La Lagune. Bringing the two together again also meant that the original name, Château La Lagune, neither petit nor grand, could also be reinstated.
Georges Brunet undertook a whirlwind redevelopment, overseeing the replanting of the entire vineyard and the construction of a modern winery, and within just a few years of his purchase the estate was once again turning out wines which fitted its status as a classed growth. Brunet, however, did not stay long. In 1961 he found himself in need of refinancing, first because he was getting divorced, second in order to purchase Château Vignelaure in Provence. I suspect he had financially overstretched himself. Thus, after just three hectic years, the estate was sold to René Chayoux (1892 – 1969) of Champagne Ayala, an individual fortunately in the necessary financial position to build upon Brunet’s efforts.
