Musée du Vin et du Négoce de Bordeaux

Discover Bordeaux’s wine trade history in an 18th-century merchant’s house, featuring historical artifacts and wine tasting.

Planning your visit

Bordeaux has traded wine for two thousand years, and the Chartrons district was where the trade happened — merchants, many of them Irish, Dutch, German and English, established cellars along the river and controlled the export business for centuries, buying from chateaux and shipping worldwide.

The Musee du Vin et du Negoce occupies an eighteenth-century merchant's house with its original barrel cellar beneath, and it covers that commercial history: the negociants, the classification of 1855 that ranked the Medoc chateaux and still governs prices, the barrels, bottles, tools and documents of the trade.

The distinction it draws is useful — this is a museum about selling wine rather than making it, and Bordeaux's wealth came from commerce as much as from vineyards.

Tastings are included and conducted in the cellar.

The Cite du Vin, the much larger modern wine museum, is a separate institution elsewhere in the city.

Bookable options include entry with wine tasting. Current availability is shown below.