Why it matters
The producer
Michel Gassier’s wines come from a family that has grown both grapes and fruit for four generations. That divided work remains visible in the estate: Michel directs the farming that supplies the wine, and his brother directs the fruit business, so the bottles sit inside a larger agricultural operation.
Thirty years ago, the brothers changed their father’s single-wine commodity model. They had to acquire new expertise to build wines with separate labels and roles; Heritage Red, for example, is a composed Grenache, Mourvèdre and Syrah blend rather than an anonymous bulk red.
Place and vineyards
Where the wines begin
Costières de Nîmes places Gassier in the Rhône, and the name on the bottle connects the family’s farming in this southern Rhône area to its wine range. The useful distinction is between the estate’s broad operation and the individual wines: Heritage Red is a named blend with its own drinking window, while Heritage White is a separate four-variety white wine.
That separation matters at the table. The red’s three-grape structure suits a bottle chosen for body, fruit and tannin over time; the white’s documented balance of ripeness and acidity points toward a fresher, dry style of Rhône white.
In the cellar
Vineyards and cellar
Michel oversees the farming behind the wine operation, while the family’s regenerative work remains in transition. His rejection of vine suffering as a prerequisite for quality points toward cultivation aimed at sound, well-grown fruit; in the finished range, that ambition is most clearly useful as a way to read Heritage White’s ripe yet acid-balanced 2023 character.
The winter 2025 planting project at Valat de la Crosse belongs to the same agricultural shift. It does not establish a new cellar method or a flavour claim, but it does locate the Heritage wines within a farm that is changing how it works around the vines.
Wines to know
The range in view
Heritage Red is the most clearly defined red in the supplied range: Grenache brings fruit and body, Mourvèdre adds savoury depth and tannin, and Syrah can contribute darker fruit and spice. Together, the blend offers a structured red wine with enough grip for a meal now and enough frame for five to eight years of ageing.
Heritage White is built from four white varieties. Its 2023 vintage is documented for the balance between ripeness and acidity, making it a different proposition from the red: dry white fruit carried by freshness rather than tannin, with the acidity keeping the texture from feeling heavy.
A useful way in
A bottle to begin with
Start with Heritage Red. Its Grenache, Mourvèdre and Syrah blend makes the family’s move from a single commodity wine to a more distinct bottle easy to see: fruit, body, savoury character, spice and tannin have separate parts to play, and the wine can be enjoyed now or cellared for five to eight years.