1837

The winemaking estate belonged to the Guinon family. Nicolas-Philibert Guinon (1807 – 1885); 1st prize in chemistry from Lycée La Martinière in Lyon in August 1827, created a dyeing company in 1831. He founded the Lyon 75th dyers’ benefit society. He was awarded the Légion d’honneur in 1855.

1847

Nicolas-Philibert Guinon refined dyeing silk plain yellow using picric acid, the first synthetic organic dyestuff discovered in the world.
The Guinon family made the Domaine du Convert (the name of the hamlet) their holiday home. At that time, the manor house, that is still standing today, neighboured the vinegrower-winemaker’s house (that stood where the Château stands today).
Construction of the château started at this time.

1871

Construction of the château, at that time known as Château du Convert, was finished in 1871 by one of the family’s sons. Architecturally, the château can definitely be considered to be original, with the main entrance porch on the opposite side to the gates, meaning that visitors have to go round and see the building as a whole. It is roofed with varnished Burgundian tiles, showing the wealth of the owner. It is said to be in the Viollet-le-Duc style.

1870-1880

The entire Beaujolais vineyard was decimated by phylloxera (a destructive aphid). The Guinon family replanted the entire estate with vines twice, in vain. This ruined them and they had to let the château go.

1891

Victor Vermorel (1848-1927) moved to Liergues, purchasing the château and its vineyards, which he replanted with vines grafted using the technique developed by Victor Pulliat (a Beaujolais ampelographer – vine specialist). He renamed it Château de l’Éclair, after his invention, a back mounted sprayer called Éclair (created in 1888) and his daughter, Victorine, who was electrocuted in a bath at the château. He died in 1927.

1928

The entire estate was taken over by the Union générale de la mutualité du Rhône (a mutual benefit organisation). Château de l’Éclair became a hospitality centre (holiday camp, convalescence home etc.). Mr. Antoine Clément, estate steward, masterfully crafted excellent Beaujolais.

1980

With the help of Mr. Bocuse, Mr. Tsuji purchased the château to house a branch of his famous culinary institute. 120 Japanese students come to Château de l’Éclair to learn the art of French gastronomy every year. Aimé Nallet, 1997 Meilleur ouvrier de France, teaches cuisine there today.

1980

SICAREX Beaujolais, a local experimental research organisation that was formed under the impetus of vinegrower-winemakers, purchased the vineyards and vatrooms in 1980. We became the owners of the Château de l’Éclair winemaking facility and a few hectares of vineyards as well as the Château de l’Éclair registered trademark.

1983

François Jacquet accepted management responsibilities for the estate. The estate activity started to grow with the purchase of a bottling and corking machine and we began to sell bottled red wine, mainly red Beaujolais.

1985

Lucien and Yves Legrand, Parisian wine merchants at Chemin des Vignes, challenged us to create a non-chaptalized wine (no added sugar), we accepted and did so. Eleven years later, we put our first cuvée of white Beaujolais on sale. The range hasn’t stopped growing since then. In turn, we have added a Beaujolais-Villages, a Chénas, a Crémant de Bourgogne, a Bourgogne Blanc, a Gamaret and even a grape juice to it; never leaving our Beaujolais and Beaujolais-Villages Nouveau behind!

1988

Jean-Luc Berger, director of SICAREX Beaujolais from 1988 to 2010, technical director at the French institute of vines and wine and expert at the International organisation of vines and wine, took over the management of this little 13-person unit. At the same time, the estate lands grew to over 20 hectares (49 acres).

1992

We redesigned our labels.

1996

We created a meeting venue for our conferences, making it available to our colleagues from other organisations. Today, it is also used to host business seminars.

At the same time as we were carrying out this refurbishment, we crafted our first cuvée of White Beaujolais, using 100 % Chardonnay.

1999

Valérie Lempereur, shared her expertise with us when she became our oenologist. Today, she is an elected representative at the International organisation of vines and wine (OIV).

2000

Arrival of Michaël Larras. He was recruited as part of the drive to restructure our vineyards on steep slopes, resulting in our first cuvée of Beaujolais-Villages called ‘Inclinaison’ using grapes from a vineyard on the commune of Rivolet.

2003

Thierry Decouchant, a technician at SICAREX Beaujolais, set out our special guidelines and the health and safety at work programme.

2006

We redesigned our labels.

2008

Amandine joined the team as sales manager to develop our wine sales and wine tourism. Hers is a professional and friendly welcome. 

2009

The estate launched its wine tourism activity. The number of visitors we welcome increases by the year.

2010

Bertrand Chatelet, who had been working here since 1999, became the new director when Jean-Luc Berger retired.
We crafted our first cuvées of Bourgogne Blanc (white Burgundy) and Gamaret to offer a wider range of products.

2011

We adopted the Optipulvé approach and reduced the number of passages by 30 %.

Our first cuvée of Beaujolais-Villages Nouveau was released on to the market.

2014

We implemented HACCP, to ensure the traceability of our wines and grape juice. Our estate joined the Terra Vitis® network.

2015

New graphics were created for the Château de l’Eclair trademark reinforcing our high-end positioning.

We also set out our Corporate social responsibility (RSE) to progress towards being an even more responsible, model and sustainable estate.

2016

We organised our first open days for the general public.

We invested in the purchase of a small harvesting machine ; it is a Beaujolais-designed prototype created to keep the bunches of grapes whole.

We added a Gamay Teinturier (with red rather than clear juice) grape juice with no added preservatives or sugar to our range. This craft grape juice is entirely natural.

2017

We replanted a vineyard in Chénas with a variety of aims including low density plantation, trellising and grassing between the rows of vines.

2018

Michaël Larras is now in charge of the estate, taking over from François Jacquet. Today, Michaël is continuing to uphold Terra Vitis® at Château de l’Eclair and, since recently, within the regional association as technical manager.