Devonian Gray Slate in a Region Built on Sandstone and Limestone

Schäwer

The Schäwer sits at the southern edge of Burrweiler in the Südliche Weinstrasse, the warm strip of the Pfalz that runs toward the French border. Its distinction is geological rather than climatic. Where most Pfalz vineyards rest on weathered sandstone, loess, loam, and limestone, the Schäwer is one of the very few sites in the region grown on slate. The name records this directly: "Schäwer" is the Palatinate dialect word for Schiefer, or slate.

A Slate Anomaly in the Pfalz

The rock here is gray Devonian slate (Grauschiefer). It reached the surface through the tectonic movement that accompanied the collapse of the Upper Rhine Graben, the rift that shaped the wider Pfalz landscape, lifting an ancient slate formation into a region otherwise defined by younger sediments. The vineyard faces south to south-southeast and is steep by Pfalz standards, with gradients reaching around 30 percent. The dark slate absorbs the day's heat and releases it to the vine roots overnight. Growers here consistently describe wines of cool, saline minerality with a faint smoky edge. Weingut Meßmer characterizes gray slate as covering only about 0.3 percent of the Pfalz, nearly all of it concentrated in this single site.

Classification and Extent

The Schäwer is a VDP.GROSSE LAGE, the top tier of the VDP's four-level classification and the equivalent of a Grand Cru. Roughly 7.2 hectares are classified at Grosse Lage level, the slate core of a larger site of around 27 hectares that also carries sandstone weathering soils and deeper loam in places. Dry Riesling from the classified slate is bottled as Grosses Gewächs (GG). Fruit from the broader site and from the estates' Schiefer plots appears as village-level (Ortswein) Riesling.

The Growers and Their Wines

Weingut Herbert Meßmer, based in Burrweiler and a VDP member since 1997, is the site's flagship. The Schäwer is the estate's most important vineyard, and its Riesling GG shows the site's grapefruit, peach, and green-pear fruit over a clear, salty, structured slate line. Meßmer also bottles a "Burrweiler Schiefer" Ortswein. Weingut Ökonomierat Rebholz added a Schäwer Riesling GG as its fourth Grosse Lage, first bottled in the 2020 vintage, alongside a "Vom Schiefer" village Riesling. Weingut Scherr farms a small parcel of about half a hectare, planted to Spätburgunder (Pinot Noir) rather than Riesling. Across these growers the constant is the slate, a cool, mineral, age-worthy style that stands apart from the riper, rounder Riesling of the Pfalz's limestone and sandstone sites.

This comprehensive guide is part of the WineSaint Wine Region Guide collection. Last updated: August 2026.