After belonging to the Villeneuve (1576- 1892) and Dubos (1892- 1980) families, Château Cantemerle was acquired by a major mutual insurance company, the SMABTP (Les Mutuelles d'Assurance du Bâtiment et des Travaux Publics), in 1981. The winemaking facilities were completely renovated and Cantemerle now enjoys a privileged position among the classified growths in the Haut-Médoc appellation. Human know-how makes the most of the estate's considerable natural blessings. The grapes are handpicked and carefully sorted. Small lots from individual vineyard plots are fermented separately in wide, low, wooden vats for the slow, gentle extraction of tannin.The wine is then aged in oak barrels for twelve months and lightly fined before château bottling.

Wine Advocate-Parker :
Readers looking for the more ethereal, elegant side of Bordeaux need search no further than Cantemerle, one of the estates in the very southern end of the Medoc. Dense ruby/purple (nearly opaque), this wine offers up notes of lead pencil shavings, spring flowers, raspberries and black cherries. The wine is ethereal, medium-bodied, and by no means a blockbuster, but long and intellectual. However, the tannins are present, and the wine is certainly capable of putting on weight with time in the bottle. Give it 3-4 years of bottle age and drink it over the following 25+ years.