Domaine Cady, 2024 Update
I doubt any family living along the banks of the Layon has had to endure such hardship as the Cady clan in recent years. The domaine, run by father-and-son team Philippe and Alexandre (with Alexandre very much in the lead these days), suffered greatly in the frost of 2021, losing a significant percentage of the crop.
So did a lot of other domaines, you might say.
And at the time Philippe suffered some ill health, which piled on the stress, and perhaps as a result the family were not so ready to respond to the frost as they might have been.
The same might be true of other vignerons and their families, you might say.
And, at about the same time, the Cady cellars – next-door to the family home on the slopes above St-Aubin-de-Luigné – were burnt to the ground in a catastrophic fire. They lost their winemaking facilities, much of their equipment, a large volume of stock residing in barrel and bottle, and a library of older vintages which told the story of their many decades of work on this corner of the Coteaux du Layon appellation, where they have been responsible – principally through their fashioning of the ultra-botrytised Cuvée Volupté, produced only in the most favourable vintages – for some of the greatest examples of Coteaux du Layon I have ever tasted.
Ahh, you might say.
Thankfully this was all more than three years ago, and brighter times seem to have arrived for the Cady family. Having made two vintages in temporary facilities, the 2023 vintage saw Alexandre and Philippe make use of their newly constructed cellars on the slopes above Rochefort-sur-Loire for the first time. Calling in on them in the middle of harvest in October 2023 I was reassured to see the press in non-stop action, and the subterranean cuves, vats, barrels and Italian cocciopesto amphorae being filled with wine.
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