Old World
Switzerland wine
A substantial producer almost nobody outside the country tastes, because the Swiss drink nearly all of it themselves.
Overview
Switzerland exports very little of what it makes — the overwhelming majority is consumed domestically — which is why a country with a long viticultural history and around 15,000 hectares under vine is close to invisible on export shelves.
Chasselas, largely dismissed elsewhere as neutral, is taken seriously here as a transmitter of site: the argument is that a grape with little flavour of its own is precisely what shows the difference between one terrace and the next.
Valais, Vaud and Geneva account for most production in the French-speaking west; Ticino in the Italian-speaking south is Merlot country, a legacy of replanting after phylloxera.
The terraced vineyards of Lavaux, above Lake Geneva, are a UNESCO World Heritage site — a rare case of viticultural landscape recognised in its own right.
Alpine and strongly site-dependent. The best vineyards sit on steep, south-facing terraces above lakes and rivers, where reflected heat and altitude combine to give ripeness with retained acidity.
Regions
continental · high-altitude
Valais
Switzerland’s largest and driest wine region, on terraced slopes of the upper Rhône, with a set of alpine varieties grown nowhere else.
continental · moderate
Vaud
Terraced vineyards above Lake Geneva, including the UNESCO-listed Lavaux, and the heartland of Swiss Chasselas.
Wines
Grapes grown here
Sources
Sources consulted
- International Organisation of Vine and Wine (OIV) — OIV
- Vitis International Variety Catalogue (VIVC) — Julius Kühn-Institut, Institute for Grapevine Breeding Geilweilerhof