The editorial was written for the introduction of One on One #8 with Nicole Rolet.

This is the story of a princess who found herself cast into a region where there were no castles, no court. A place full of … peasants. I may be exaggerating a little bit on the princess side, but the region could be called the end of the world. And my manners force me to stay polite. Mind you there is nothing wrong with the end of the world. Some people seek this. For others, well… then again love can be very persuasive. You jump then you think about it.

I can almost picture the scene: “Honey, this is your new home,” says her husband showing her a decrepit old house in the middle of nowhere in the south of France. “Oh, sorry, got to go, I have a meeting in London. Bye”

Leaving a known life, you could say her comfort zone, she went into the unknown and sometimes obscure world of winemaking.

Drinking wine is the easy part, making it and selling it are the hard parts. And if you add creating a world-class wine to the equation it gets even harder.

But our princess, full of the beautiful stories she read in her childhood and youth, driven by love and passion, determined to make it work, threw all her effort into the herculean task. If she could handle the highest powers and most influential people in the world, that was her former life, it’s not a few vines that will deter her.

And so she did. Not alone, mind you, as she knows how to get people on her side.
Her agenda looks like that of a head of state but what she does, in my opinion, is more important than what a head of state does.

And after a few years, she is producing a fine wine recognized as such by experts worldwide, fighting to support underappreciated grapes, supporting women in the world of wine, and co-creating a think tank to ensure the future of fine wines.
The princess has become the queen of her castle within the backdrop, a beautiful blue oak, Chêne Bleu, the name of the winery.