| First and foremost this is the story of a man, Henri Martin, the son of a cooper whose family history in Medoc went back for a number of centuries. It all began with a little vineyard, historically owned by the family, called Chateau Haut-Beychevelle Gloria, and it ended with the acquisition of Chateau Saint-Pierre, which had been given Grand Cru Classe status in 1855. In the meantime, Henri Martin created a world-renowned estate, Chateau Gloria. These three vineyards are all in the prestigious Saint-Julien appellation, but he also acquired Chateau Bel Air, a Haut-Medoc cru bourgeois, in the early 1980s. The total area covered by all of them amounted to a little over 105 hectares. Henri Martin died in 1991 and the estates are now run by his daughter Francoise and his son-in-law Jean-Louis Triaud, backed up by their children, Vanessa and Jean. |
