Not Your Grandad’s Bordeaux: How Shuette Winery Is Reimagining a Tradition-Bound Region Through Natural Wine

When Ian Hocking and his wife began searching for a place to build a winery, they didn’t have France in mind. They didn’t even have Bordeaux in mind. What they did have was an idea that challenged the rules, imagery, and expectations of some of the world’s most tradition-bound wine regions.

“We took two years to find the location for Shuette,” Hocking said, sharing about his search across Europe to find the perfect place to turn his vision into reality. “Our search was never about a country, region, or style. We wanted an estate with a working, healthy organic or biodynamic vineyard, with space to enrich the environment through regenerative farming practices.”

That search ended in Entre-Deux-Mers, perched beside the tidal Dordogne River, in a place where 40-year-old vines have survived on organic growing practices since their planting. The couple named the project Shuette Winery. Their mission: to push Bordeaux toward a future where natural wine, regenerative agriculture, and consumer-driven styles become not fringe experiments but viable paths for the region itself.

“France is one of the few places where you can still get fantastic terroir with attached farmland,” Hocking said. “Usually, great grape-growing areas have been totally consumed by monoculture vineyards.” That attachment to land would shape Shuette’s identity far more than Bordeaux’s centuries of rules ever could.

Today, Shuette is being hailed by younger drinkers, natural-wine buyers, and eco-minded importers as part of a small but growing shift inside France. It is the idea that Bordeaux — so often symbolized by grand châteaux, cabernet blends and en primeur futures — can evolve.

And perhaps, it must.

A New Blueprint for a Region in Flux

To the outside world, Bordeaux represents stability and prestige. But inside the region, growers face a stark reality: climate change is reshaping ripening patterns, farming costs are rising, and younger drinkers are increasingly drawn to wines that are lighter, fresher, lower-intervention, and transparent about farming.

Hocking has seen it firsthand. “There are roughly 7,000 wineries in Bordeaux, and currently only about 53 of them produce some natural wine,” he said. “However, they predominantly make traditional Bordeaux red wine with reduced sulphites. Whilst it’s great to see, for me, that does not go far enough to showcase what the Bordeaux terroir can produce and respond to what consumers want.”

Though Hocking is diplomatic in his approach to evolving the world of Bordeaux wines, his approach and winery demonstrates a growing need in the industry, not just for the traditional French wine regions, but also for Old World wine regions — to broaden their identities and offerings or risk being left behind. Shuette is creating a working model that might help it catch up.

For Hocking, the central question is philosophical as much as technical. “I enjoy classic Bordeaux and think it has a place,” he said. “But our mission is to ask, ‘what would you make here if the A.O.C. never existed?’” His answer reveals the through-line of the entire project: let the vineyard speak without forcing it into a mold.

That means zero-zero winemaking (no added sulphites), regenerative farming, experimentation with skin contact and flor aging (aging in contact with a yeast layer that forms on the wine’s surface and protects it during maturation), and a portfolio that features pét-nat, semi-carbonic Merlot and orange wine alongside reimagined Bordeaux varieties.

Yet Hocking is convinced that Bordeaux can support this movement. In fact, he says, the terroir demands it.

A Vineyard Unlike Its Neighbors

Shuette’s vineyard sits in one contiguous block along the Dordogne, a rare configuration in a region carved into decades of small parcels and inherited boundaries. The river defines the land. It cools the vines through morning fog, extends the growing season and deposits mineral-rich soils that give both acidity and concentration.

“Its 40-year-old vines have always been organic and cared for by hand,” Hocking said. “That’s extremely rare in Bordeaux, where barely 12 percent of vineyards are organic today.”

Shuette farms nine grape varieties, including the region’s classics — Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Malbec, Petit Verdot and Sémillon — but also Chenin Blanc and Souvignier Gris, a PiWi hybrid bred for disease resistance. With 4.5 hectares under vine and 12 hectares total farmland, the goal is biodiversity, not maximization.

“At Shuette we follow regenerative farming principles that encompass organic farming with biodynamic practices, agroforestry, wildlife preservation and diversification,” he said. “We have over 250 fruit trees planted through and around the vineyard, each with its own bird box and wild border.”

It is a vineyard that isn’t just farmed. It is inhabited.

In a region where monoculture is the norm, Hocking’s model introduces a radically different image of what a Bordeaux estate can look like. Visitors to the winery can see a landscape closer to a permaculture farm than a conventional château.  

Crucially, this ecological approach is not aesthetic. It is structural to how Shuette makes wine.

How Shuette Winery Is Staying On the Cutting Edge of Wine Making

Inside the cellar, Shuette’s methods diverge sharply from Bordeaux orthodoxy. There is no mechanical pressing, no new oak, no additives. Their wines are bottled unfined and unfiltered. Since 2024, they have moved to a strict zero-zero approach.

“We’ve always made natural wine, but since 2024 we have moved to a zero-zero approach and therefore do not add any sulphites,” Hocking said.

Shuette uses free-run juice only, a technique that sacrifices yield but not precision. Pressed juice (about 20 percent) goes elsewhere, often for the brandy base of their Umeshu. Winemaking decisions begin with vineyard maturity tests in August. Until then, nothing is predetermined.

“It’s not until you see the color, smell the aromas and taste the juice that you can say what that plot should become,” Hocking said. “We adapt the style of wine to the product rather than trying to force it to be something else.”

The resulting wines which are light, bright, and fruit-forward defy the perception of Bordeaux as heavy, structured, and tannic. They challenge the entrenched idea that Bordeaux has only one voice.

Solis, Shuette’s dark rosé, is made entirely from Merlot. The grapes are destemmed, left to gently press themselves under their own weight and racked continuously for eight hours to extract color and aroma.

“The juice filters naturally through the skins picking up some extra color and aromas of cranberry and raspberry,” Hocking explained. “The must is spontaneously fermented, allowed to go through malolactic fermentation and then aged with the lees for seven months in stainless steel.”

Shuette’s orange wine, which is half Sauvignon Blanc, half Sémillon,  follows its own experimental path. Grapes are destemmed and gravity-pressed, skins macerate for a month, daily pour-overs gently extract color, and batonnage develops body.

“Regular battonage builds more body and a week of post fermentation oxidation rounds the fruit character,” Hocking said. The wine then ages under flor, a method more reminiscent of Sherry or Jura than Bordeaux.

Shuette uses a mix of neutral oak, concrete tanks, and stainless steel, choosing vessels based on expression rather than tradition.

The wines are, in Hocking’s words, “modern, delicious and interesting to consumers.”

And they are resonating.

Building a New Audience for Bordeaux

The Shuette team has spent recent months at wine fairs across Europe. The reception, Hocking says, has been enthusiastic.

“We have been attending wine fairs since November (of 2024), meeting a lot of consumers and buyers who are really excited to see a project like ours in Bordeaux” he said.

Shuette’s tagline, “Not your grandad’s Bordeaux,” is more than a marketing line. It’s a declaration that the region can break old expectations without abandoning its identity.

Hocking’s aim isn’t to replace classic Bordeaux but to expand the region’s repertoire.

A Safety Net for Organic Growers: The “Renegades” Project

One of the region’s greatest vulnerabilities is the cost of organic farming. Hocking has spoken to dozens of growers struggling to survive economically despite dedicating themselves to sustainable agriculture.

“More needs to happen today to support quality organic growers,” he said. “I’ve spoken to many growers returning to conventional methods or pulling up their vineyards altogether because the cost of farming organically is too high versus the support they receive.”

Shuette is trying to intervene.

The winery has expanded into négoce production, sourcing grapes from local organic growers to make 28,000 bottles of pét-nat and still wine under a new line called Renegades.

“We call this project Renegades, as that is what we think these amazing organic growers in the region are,” Hocking said.

The aim is twofold: offer growers financial stability and create natural Bordeaux wines at more approachable price points. Scale, Hocking believes, can make natural wine accessible without compromising values. This type of partnership could redefine how smaller growers survive in regions dominated by industrial agriculture.

A Path Forward for Bordeaux and Beyond

Hocking is cautious not to preach or position Shuette as oppositional to its neighbors. When asked how other wineries perceive them, he answered simply: “People often ask me what our neighbours think about us. The honest answer is: I don’t know — and that’s okay. We’re focused on what we believe in.”

He is not trying to overthrow Bordeaux tradition but to widen it. To show that the region can support diversity without fracturing.

The emergence of natural winemakers is part of a larger movement sweeping through historically traditional wine regions. 

“I’m excited to see new, young winemakers coming into the region, taking advantage of lower land prices to start their journey,” Hocking said.

Still, systemic support remains essential. Without it, the risk is that Bordeaux loses the very people most capable of guiding it into the future.

“In order for the new wave of natural winemakers to be successful, we really need buyers and influencers to look beyond the history of Bordeaux and support the growers and producers of modern Bordeaux wine,” Hocking said.

A New Image for Bordeaux

Shuette Winery presents a provocative possibility: that the future of Bordeaux will not be defined solely by its past.

The industry often treats tradition as an anchor,  grounding, reliable, and immovable. But anchors can also hold things in place when the winds have already changed direction. What Hocking and Shuette are offering is not rebellion for rebellion’s sake. It’s a pragmatic, ecological, and deeply intentional reimagining of what Bordeaux can be.

Shuette is not trying to escape Bordeaux. It is trying to help it evolve.

➡️ Learn more about Shuette here: https://www.shuette.com