XO PLATINUM (700 ml)

At Château de Bordeneuve near Eauze, the Guasch family — father Jean-Claude and son Thomas — controls every stage from vine to bottle, a vertical integration rare even within Armagnac. The estate's deliberate retention of Baco, a hybrid grape now largely restricted to this single appellation, is the defining transgression: where most modern houses have shifted to all-Ugni Blanc, Sigognac blends 50% Baco / 50% Ugni Blanc, the Baco driving the house's characteristic fruit density and textural richness.

The vineyards sit on sables fauves — the tawny sandy soils of Bas-Armagnac's innermost zone — that drain freely, stress the vine, and yield distillates of unusual aromatic precision. Distillation runs through a copper alembic armagnacais dating to 1921, a single-pass continuous still producing spirit at approximately 56% ABV, well below Cognac's double-distilled output, preserving a far greater congener load and aromatic complexity. The XO Platinum matures in Limousin and Vosges forest oak barrels of 400–420 litres, the extended ageing developing rancio character within the estate's medieval cellars, where beaten-earth floors maintain a stable microclimate. The result is an XO that carries Bas-Armagnac's fruit-forward DNA into genuinely aged, oxidative depth — a profile no Cognac house, and few Armagnac négociants, can replicate from a single estate.