Images From France's Best Cognac Houses

While it's always fun to get down and dirty in a dank Scottish warehouse, or dive deep into the cellar of a great Armagnac producer, there's no comparison to the environment we're presented with while tasting brandy at the great French Cognac houses. I think you could make an interior design coffee table book just from images taken from these places. Take for example the photo above I snapped while getting ready for a posh evening of drinks at Hennessy's Chateau de Bagnolet. Can you imagine a better space to sip some yak?

Or this one, taken in 2012 at Raymond Ragnaud. It's simply the epitome of romantic French rusticity, is it not?

A lovely plate of pastries for our pleasure while tasting with Dudognon at their Grand Champagne estate.

The vine covered exterior in the courtyard at Ragnaud-Sabourin.

But easily the most wonderful and breathtaking of them all is the parlor at the house of Hine, designed by English experimentalist Russell Sage. It's one of the coolest rooms I've ever sat in, period.

And I got to drink some delicious Cognac while doing so.

-David Driscoll