Katya, Domaine de Cassagnas

The Impact:

⛰️ Scale: 8 Hectares

🤝 Human Impact: 9-person team

🌱 Philosophy: Certified Organic & Vins Methode Nature

🌳 Biodiversity: Active Agroforestry
Domaine de Cassagnas Vineyard with green leaves and wooden stakes against a mountainous landscape
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Winemaker Katya de Cazenove and her two young daughters in domaine de Cassagnas

The Story

After a career in the food industry, I chose in 2020 to return to what matters most. Though originally from elsewhere, moving to the Cévennes was about more than just living here; it was about taking root. I planted 25,000 vines and 240 trees as a testament to that commitment.

Today, the first cuvées of Grenache, Aubun, and Marselan are crafted in a rehabilitated former railway station, serving as a temporary home until a bioclimatic cellar is built in the heart of the vines. When the wind rustles through the leaves today, I like to believe it whispers with my accent. In these lands, I have found much more than a place to work; I have found my home.

Philosophy

Environmental sustainability and creative freedom guide every gesture. The estate is certified organic, and every grape is harvested by hand. In the cellar, I practice minimal intervention—utilising indigenous yeasts with no fining or filtration—to allow the land to speak for itself.

I view the estate as a vast field of experimentation. As new grape varieties come into production each year, the possibilities expand. This creative energy results in about ten distinct cuvées annually, each one a unique vibration of a specific grape variety and the terroir it inhabits.
Domaine de Cassagnas Vineyard with green leaves and wooden stakes against a mountainous landscape

The Vineyard: Domaine de Cassagnas

The estate spans 9 hectares at the foot of the Cévennes mountains, featuring a main 7-hectare plot designed as a living ecosystem. Guided by the principles of vitiforestry, the vineyard is home to 16 diverse grape varieties—including Assyrtiko, Chenin, Verdelho, and Saperavi—interspersed with 240 trees, including olives, apples, and oaks.

Between the vine rows, which are trained in the traditional gobelet style with old-fashioned wooden stakes, stretch corridors of honey-producing flowers that welcome birds and beneficial insects. The terroir is a complex mosaic: roots delve into ancient marl over limestone or siliceous sandstone carried down from the Cévennes by water and time. Surrounded by woods and streams, the vineyard is a sanctuary for biodiversity, further enriched by the presence of a neighbour’s beehives.