Cathiard Vineyard (Head Winemaker & General Manager)

Justine Labbé possesses impressive academic credentials in the form of an Engineer’s degree in Soil Science and Agronomy that she earned in 2018 from the Purpan School of Engineers, a Jesuit-founded graduate program in Toulouse, France, and associated with the National Polytechnique de Toulouse. Alongside this degree, she also completed a master’s degree in winery management.

As part of her university education, Justine was a thesis assistant at the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh, Scotland, in mid-2015, followed by internships at the Cave cooperative viticole de Bonnieux in the Rhone-Alpes region in 2016, the Vicariat Apostolique de Phnom Penh in Cambodia, the next year, and Château Thieuley in the Bordeaux region in 2017. She furthered her experience internationally by completing internships at Pine Ridge Vineyards in the Napa Valley as an assistant lab enologist in 2018 and as a harvest intern at Moss Wood in the Margaret River region of Australia in 2019.

Following this amazing series of internships, Justine joined Château Smith Haut in Bordeaux as assistant cellar master, a role she held until being named general manager and winemaker for Cathiard Vineyard in Napa in 2021. She arrived at Cathiard during the Covid pandemic, which added to the challenges she faced because of the possibility of smoke taint for that particular vintage. Nonetheless, Justine immediately initiated changes in the vineyard and the cellar, including replacing some of the Merlot vines with Cabernet Sauvignon, adding stainless-steel vats, and converting the estate to organic viticulture.

Justine is crafting three estate wines, a flagship Cabernet Sauvignon and two premium red blends. Her philosophy about winemaking is best captured in her own words: “Let the terroir speak. [At Cathiard] we have one foot in France giving the wine a French freshness and elegance, with the other foot in the exceptional terroir of Napa Valley.”

Growing up in a family that greatly enjoys wine, Justine was introduced to it at home and when the family visited various chateaus. But this is unlikely to be why she pursued winemaking as a career. Rather, she described her passion for winemaking as coming from her desire to combine the artistic—coming from her own experiences and perceptions—with the scientific— coming from her studies in biology, physics, and chemistry. She both loves and is fascinated by the evolution of wines over time.

She is currently living in Napa, and when not at the winery, likes to paint, draw, and read; the latter activity may be related to the fact that her parents own a bookshop in France. Justine also enjoys good food, cheese being a favorite, and running with her beloved husky.