Cite du Vin

The Cite du Vin opened in 2016 in a curved aluminium and glass building by XTU architects, whose shape is variously explained as wine swirling in a glass, a gnarled vine stock or the eddies of the Garonne beside it. The permanent exhibition deliberately avoids being a Bordeaux museum: it covers wine cultures worldwide, from Georgia and the Caucasus to the New World, through screens, smell stations, films and interactive tables rather than objects and bottles. The ticket includes a glass in the Belvedere on the eighth floor, which looks over the river and the city. A tower of bottles from around the world stands in the cellar shop.

History

The project for a cultural and tourist centre devoted to wine began in 2009, led by an association of the Aquitaine region, Bordeaux Métropole, the city, the Bordeaux wine council and the chamber of commerce. The building was designed by Anouk Legendre and Nicolas Desmazières of the XTU agency; its cost, put at about 63 million euros in 2011, had risen to some 81.1 million by 2015. It was officially opened on 31 May 2016 and to the public on 1 June 2016, and it passed one million visitors in the autumn of 2018 and two million in May 2022 (Wikipedia, Cité du Vin).

Highlights

• The building - a curved aluminium form on the riverfront.
• The world exhibition - wine cultures from Georgia to the New World.
• The smell stations - aroma exercises through the permanent route.
• The Belvedere tasting - a glass on the eighth floor over the Garonne.

When to go

Year-round; it closes some Mondays in low season and for a January break. Timed entry is used at peak. Allow two to three hours for the permanent route.

What to expect

It is a multimedia experience rather than a collection of objects, which some find thin. There is no vineyard or working cellar here. The included glass is a single pour.

Nearby

Bordeaux old town lies south along the river; Saint-Emilion is east.

Key facts