RdV Vineyards, the upstart winery determined to prove that Virginia wine could stand proudly among the world’s best in quality and price, has been purchased by the owners of Bordeaux’s famed Château Montrose, the companies announced Monday in a joint statement posted on the RdV website.

The sale represents the first entry by a Bordeaux powerhouse into the eastern United States and the first major foreign wine investment in Virginia since Italy’s Zonin family established Barboursville Vineyards in 1976. Financial terms were not disclosed.

RdV’s founder, Rutger de Vink, will remain through the 2024 harvest as a consultant. The rest of the RdV team will stay on board, including winemaker Joshua Grainer, a master of wine. The winery will be renamed Lost Mountain Vineyards, after the series of hills on which the vineyard sits, and will be under the direction of Grainer and Pierre Graffeuille, CEO of Château Montrose.

“The renaming is a natural outcome of the purchase and a celebration of the new era,” the companies said in the statement, which was expected to be issued in Bordeaux on Tuesday. “Converting RdV, Rutger de Vink’s initials, into ‘Lost Mountain’ pays tribute to the remarkable terroir of this ancient knoll once beloved by America’s founding father, George Washington.”

In an email to close contacts Monday, de Vink praised his winery team and supporters. “This time has given me purpose and happiness, not to mention the fulfillment of knowing we have created a world-class wine and helped put Virginia on the worldwide wine map,” he wrote. “Together, we have created something that many said could not be done.”

Château Montrose is a leading producer in the St.-Estèphe appellation of Bordeaux’s Left Bank. Classified as a second growth under the 1855 Bordeaux classification, it has been owned since 2006 by Martin and Olivier Bouygues, billionaire brothers who steer a family conglomerate operating in telecommunications, media and construction. They also own Château Tronquoy in St.-Estèphe, Clos Rougeard in the Loire Valley and Domaine Henri Rebourseau in Burgundy, as well as a cognac distillery and a truffle farm. This will be their first U.S. wine venture.

Those holdings and Lost Mountain Vineyards will be grouped under a new company called Eutopia Estates, the announcement said. It will be headed by Charlotte Bouygues, daughter of Martin and Melissa Bouygues. Melissa is a native of Baton Rouge.

Montrose is the first Bordeaux house to invest in Virginia, but the Old Dominion has enjoyed French influence over the years. De Vink enlisted Eric Boissenot, a consultant for four of the five Bordeaux first-growth chateaux, to blend his wines, and Jean-Philippe Roby to consult in the vineyard. Michel Rolland, Stephane Deronencourt and Lucien Guillemet have consulted elsewhere in Virginia. And several French-born winemakers are currently active. Several Bordeaux wineries have properties or partnerships in Napa Valley.

In 2004, after apprenticing under Jim Law at Linden Vineyards in Virginia and David Ramey in California, de Vink purchased a 93-acre sheep farm off Route 17 near Delaplane, in Fauquier County. The estate now includes 18 acres under vine, mostly Bordeaux varieties, cabernet sauvignon, merlot, cabernet franc and petit verdot, and a retro-modern winery that resembles a farmhouse on the outside and a concrete and metal temple to wine inside.

From the 2008 vintage, RdV focused on two wines: a top cuvée called Lost Mountain, based on cabernet sauvignon, and a second blend, Rendezvous. Juice that didn’t make these wines was bottled as Friends and Family and occasionally showed up in shops or restaurants. RdV has also made small amounts of rosé and this year will produce its first white, a blend of albarino and semillon.

Even before RdV released its inaugural 2008s in April 2011, it was generating buzz as a potential Virginia first growth or an American grand cru.

Critics were impressed with the initial wines but skeptical that any from Virginia could fetch $88 and $55 a bottle. De Vink proved the skeptics wrong: The wines were an immediate success and caught the attention of British wine writer Jancis Robinson and chefs Eric Ziebold and José Andrés. The wines have improved over the years and are now on wine lists at many of the nation’s top restaurants, including Le Bernardin and Per Se in New York and the Bazaar and Minibar in Washington.

De Vink rejected the hospitality model familiar at Virginia wineries. RdV has no tasting room and does not host weddings. Tastings are by appointment and cost up to $140 for a tour and tasting, including food and library vintages. Sales are primarily through a membership program, with the current release of the Lost Mountain 2021 selling for $225 a bottle to members. Rendezvous currently sells for $110. The winery has about 2,000 members, de Vink said.

By focusing on one primary wine, the Lost Mountain, and making no compromises on quality, de Vink believed he could produce extraordinary wine. He used the analogy of automakers with a wide range of vehicles vs. those that specialize in one exceptional product.

“I wanted to make a Ferrari,” he said.

The French buyers did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but in an interview de Vink said RdV’s focus on quality caught the eye of Graffeuille when he visited the United States last fall to scout out prospective acquisitions. Martin and Oliver Bouygyes visited RdV in February, and sale negotiations began soon thereafter.

When he launched RdV, de Vink often poured his wine alongside Château Montrose and a high-end Napa cabernet sauvignon to demonstrate that it belonged at that level. Handing his project off to the Bouygues brothers “feels like coming full circle,” he said.

De Vink, an avid mountaineer and skier, said he and his wife, Jenny Marie, will relocate somewhere in the western United States or Canada where mountains and snow are plentiful.

Aside from the new name, the joint announcement of the sale gave little indication of any major change in direction for the winery. Grainer, who has been at RdV since the beginning and earned the master of wine title in 2022, said his charge from the new owners is to improve the vineyards so that more of the wine qualifies to make the top cuvée. That will mean less Rendezvous and Friends and Family, he said.

At Montrose, the Bouygues constructed new production facilities and purchased additional vineyards. At RdV for now, at least, the emphasis is on continuity and “ensuring quality and reverence for the vineyard’s storied past while steering it toward a promising future,” the joint statement said.

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