Emma Watson’s Family Vineyard and the Story of Renais Gin

Published: September 11, 2026 by Adam Hay-Nicholls

Adam Hay-Nicholls heads to Chablis to discover Emma Watson’s family vineyard and its unique gin…

Here’s what you can normally expect from a French wine festival: flowing robes, brass brands, oysters and merguez hotdogs, local beauty queens, a rousing speech from a tricolour-sashed mayor, and a lot of very excellent plonk. But in the case of the most recent Fête des Vins de Chablis, I was also offered servings of a unique gin; one with an unusually authentic and discreet celebrity connection.

I’m visiting at the invitation of the Watson family, from Oxfordshire, who’ve had links here since the early 1990s. Patriarch Chris Watson is a greatly-admired technology and communications lawyer. Thirty-five years ago, Chris, who is multilingual, was working in Paris and became close friends with a wine-making family in Chablis. One thing led to another – as things often do over glasses of good Burgundy – and pretty soon Chris had his own plot of vines. Domaine Watson has since grown to seven plots, nestled closely together in the rolling Kimmeridgian limestone uplands of Chablis and nearby Irancy (Pinot Noir).

When they were young, Chris’s children, Emma (as in Hermione from the Harry Potter films) and Alex, would spend every holiday here picking grapes and becoming ingrained in this small French community. Both were born in Paris and are fluent in the lingo; while Emma, 36, focused on acting, academia and activism, Alex, 33, was drawn to hospitality and the drinks trade. After studying philosophy at Bristol, and then a spell living and working at Chablis’ Domaine des Malandes, he landed his dream job at Diageo.

He worked with the brand teams of Guinness, Tanqueray and a variety of premium spirits. Alex “was drawn to brands with a strong sense of place.” One of his takeaways: “There’s still some headway in gin. I don’t think gin has had its moment in luxury the way that most other spirits have had.”

Alex left Diageo after nearly 10 years and went independent. Three years ago, he and Emma launched Renais, their very own small-batch gin brand. Priced at £45 a bottle, it’s intimately connected to the Chablis terroir.

‘Renais’ is French for ‘rebirth’, and this gin gives Domaine Watson‘s Chardonnay grapes a second life. Grape skins are salvaged after pressing and upcycled to give the amber-hued Renais its sweetness and minerality; Chablis is embedded in the taste, and like a fine wine it keeps developing as you drink it. You can even enjoy it neat. It’s infused with all-natural, rare botanicals including cubeb berries, acacia honey, linden flower and rock salt.

Alex takes care of the operational and business side of things, while Emma is more involved in the creative, directing the marketing imagery and artwork, for example.

The bottles are handsome art pieces, with rippled glass that emulate rows of yellowing vines. Sustainability is one of Alex and Emma’s passions. “When I explained my idea,” says Alex, “and how it would help Dad to reduce waste, she was like, Yeah, absolutely, I’m in!”. This is a very forward-thinking, sustainable way of making spirits. And it’s cultivated in Chablis, it embraces winemaking techniques and philosophy, and it’s distilled in England. So it has a foot in France and the UK, just like us. Emma really lent her creativity to the project. It’s very sweet that it’s a whole family project.”

Alas, the Watsons don’t have their own château – instead, they hit Airbnb when they’re in town. For the festival weekend, we took over a lovely manoir and fixed ourselves some ‘terroir’ martinis: Renais stirred over ice with a soupçon of crisp white Domaine Watson (£29.50 a bottle) and two dashes of lemon bitters, then strained and garnished with lemon peel. Drier than a vermouth martini, it has a wonderfully vibrant, floral and citrusy taste.

Alex and Emma’s stepmum, Liz, chauffeured us into town for the wine festival, where Chris had already been pressing the flesh since the crack of dawn. He is a Pilier. Les Piliers Chablisiens is a Bacchic brotherhood created in 1953 to acknowledge those who uphold the quality of Chablis wines and protect the region for future generations. They were resplendent in their green robes and shiny yellow capes. Around their necks, they each wore a tastevin-a shallow silver cup with which they judge the produce.

There are around 17 Piliers, and Chris is the only foreigner to have been accepted into the gang, a tribute to his relationship-building and the respect the local honchos have for him as a vigneron. The Piliers marched through the town, past the tasting tents and artisanal food stalls, followed behind by beret-wearing, horn-parping musicians with twirly moustaches, and Mademoiselles Chablis and Bourgogne, wearing their tiaras. We were given a glass each and left to run amok, a vertical tasting invitation at every turn. The winemakers were all in attendance, exhibiting their wares. There was even a mini motor show, where one could kick the tyres on some brand new tractors and harvesters.

“We’ve been coming to this festival every year since we were tiny kids,” says Alex.

“Emma’s been coming here since she was five, so everyone knows her. Here, people are more likely to stop and ask for a photo with my dad!” I imagine it must have been an invaluable sanctuary when Harry Potter fandom was at its height.

Lots of celebrities have invested in booze brands and front campaigns (the gin market alone includes Margot Robbie’s Papa Salt, Ryan Reynolds Aviation American Gin and James May’s James Gin), but Renais is the antithesis of that. Emma Watson is not the figurehead – this is a far more authentic enterprise, a family-run start-up that has the love and support of a close-knit rural community behind it. And that’s not an easy nut to crack in a traditional and tightly-controlled appellation like Chablis.

It’s the Watson family’s considerable charm, sensitivity and reverence for Burgundy and its vignerons that has led to them being embraced by the establishment. Yet with Renais, Alex is doing something really innovative. He is inspiring the younger Burgundian vignerons who are taking over their family vineyards, all of whom he has grown up with.

The passion behind the produce, the effort that goes into producing the wine, the idea of terroir and a sense of place all of those are fundamental to what I wanted to do with Renais,” says Alex, as we drive back to the station the following morning.

“It’s the essence of the place, and the festival, and the people, with some of the same values, the same ingredients – I wanted to carry that forward in the product. This,” he says, gesturing to the autumnal vines whizzing past the car’s windows, “is like taking people to the source.”

domainewatson.com | www.renais.co.uk