Château Canon occupies a walled vineyard on the limestone plateau immediately west of Saint-Émilion town, with cellars cut down into the rock beneath it. The limestone is what makes the difference here: it holds water through dry summers and gives a chalky, fine-boned quality quite unlike the plummier Merlot grown on the sandy ground below the hill.
In 1985 the property belonged to the Fournier family, who had owned it since 1919 and were then in their final decade in charge, before Chanel bought the estate in 1996 and rebuilt it from the cellar up. The mid-1980s wines are the good end of the Fournier years, made before the cellar troubles that dogged the property at the start of the following decade.
The vintage was warm and dry, and on this limestone that produced wines of poise rather than sheer weight. A Premier Grand Cru Classé from a named year, forty years in bottle, at well under the price of the Médoc first growths from the same harvest.
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Producer: Château Canon
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Vintage: 1985
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Appellation: Saint-Émilion AOC
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Format: 75cl
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Region: Bordeaux, France
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Style: Red
Where it is likely to be now. A 1985 Canon will be fully mature now, light-framed and fine if it has been kept cold and still, and like every pre-1990 bottle here it is sold as a collectible item rather than with a guarantee of drinkability.
Who it suits. For someone turning forty-one in 2026 who prefers finesse to power, or for a Saint-Émilion drinker who will recognise the estate at once.
Condition. The capsule shows corrosion, the dull pitting old foil picks up in a damp cellar; it is a surface blemish rather than evidence of leakage, and the fill is verified before dispatch.
Provenance. Bought to order from a professional European merchant. We check fill, label and capsule when the bottle reaches us and photograph it before it ships.
Delivered in 7 to 10 working days, tracked. Transit cover can be added at checkout.
Sold as a collectible item, as seen. No guarantee is given on drinkability.
