Bollinger

In the small town of Aÿ, situated in the Montagne de Reims, there is a Champagne house that has been owned by virtually the same family since 1829. ‘Bollinger’ is one of the last great Champagne houses to have retained its independence, and it operates according to principles that most of its neighbours abandoned several decades ago. It still employs a full-time cooper. The cellars still hold a million magnums of reserve champagne. And it still refuses to use anything other than Pinot Noir as the basis for its wines.

History

The house was founded on 6 February 1829 by three men who played very different roles. Athanase de Villermont inherited land in Ay, but, as a member of the nobility, was not permitted to engage in commercial activities. Joseph ‘Jacques’ Bollinger was a salesman. Paul Renaudin was a winemaker. Together they founded the company ‘Renaudin-Bollinger & Cie’, where Joseph was responsible for sales and Paul for cellar operations. Jacques married Athanase’s daughter, Charlotte de Villermont, thereby securing the Bollinger name within the family for many generations to come.

The house has been home to a whole succession of colourful characters. Georges Bollinger steered it through the phylloxera epidemic, the 1911 winegrowers’ revolt and the First World War, even defending the village of Ay from marauders in 1916. His son Jacques expanded the vineyards and built the cellars that still stand today. Then came perhaps the most famous figure in the history of ‘Bollinger’: Madame Elizabeth Bollinger, known as Lily, who took over the reins after her husband’s death in 1941 and led the house for three decades, travelling the world to cement its reputation. Her quotes are still quoted today; her most famous remark, made to a London newspaper in 1961, is: ‘I drink champagne when I’m happy, when I’m sad, when I’m alone and when I’m in company.’ In 1994, management passed to Gislain de Montgolfier, the founder’s great-grandson. Since 2017, Charles-Armand de Belene has held the position of managing director.

Vineyards

‘Bollinger’ owns 180 hectares of vineyards, one of the largest vineyard estates among all the Champagne houses, 85 per cent of which consists of ‘Grand Cru’ and ‘Premier Cru’ plots, located across seven sites: Aÿ, Avenay, Tauxières, Louvois and Verzenay for Pinot Noir in the Montagne de Reims area, Cuis for Chardonnay on the Côte des Blancs, and Champvoisy for Pinot Meunier in the Marne Valley. These vineyards account for over 60 per cent of Bollinger’s total production.

Two small plots on the house’s own vineyards, ‘Clos Saint-Jacques’ and ‘Chôte-Terre’ in Ay were never affected by phylloxera. These ungrafted vines, planted before the phylloxera epidemic, are still tended and propagated by hand using a traditional technique known as ‘provignage’, laying shoots on the ground to root as new plants.

Terroir

The Montagne de Reims, with its chalky soils and north-facing slopes, is a classic region for the Pinot Noir grape. Pinot Noir accounts for over 60 per cent of Bollinger’s own vineyards, and this same proportion is directly reflected in the Special Cuvée blend. The chalky subsoil lends the wines their characteristic freshness and mineral notes, whilst the south-facing plots in Ay, often referred to as the ‘Romanée-Conti of Champagne’ due to their exceptional intensity, add power and fullness to the wines.

Grape varieties

Pinot Noir is the undisputed cornerstone of the house, lending the wines power, fullness and longevity. Chardonnay brings freshness and precision, whilst Pinot Meunier adds a subtle fruity nuance and softness.

The flagship ‘Cuvée Spéciale’ blend consists of 60 per cent Pinot Noir, 25 per cent Chardonnay and 15 per cent Meunier, with over 85 per cent of the grapes sourced from Grand Cru and Premier Cru vineyards.

Winemaking

Every Bollinger wine is aged in oak barrels, an approach that is virtually unique amongst the major Champagne houses today. The house has its own in-house cooper, the last cooper to live in the entire Champagne region, who maintains a stock of around 4,000 barrels, some of which are nearly a century old.

All wines undergo manual riddling and disgorgement. The reserve wines for non-vintage blends are stored not in tanks or barrels, but in magnums, a practice established at Bollinger since 1890 and unique to Champagne. At any given time, around one million reserve magnums are stored in the cellars, which contributes to the stability and complexity of the non-vintage wines’ flavour. Each cuvée is aged on its lees for at least twice as long as required by the Champagne appellation.

Wines

The range extends from the Special Cuvée, the flagship non-vintage blend, produced under its English name since 1911, through Bollinger Rosé and the vintage La Grande Année, to the prestigious R.D., which stands for Récemment Dégorgé (‘recently disgorged’). First released in 1963 by Madame Bollinger herself, the R.D. is a vintage wine aged on its lees for at least eight years prior to disgorgement, which gives it a freshness that standard long-aged Champagne cannot match.

At the very top of the range is Vieilles Vignes Françaises, a ‘blanc de noirs’ made from grapes grown on two plots in Ay, where ungrafted vines predating phylloxera are cultivated; it is produced in minuscule quantities and released only in exceptional years.

The latest addition to the range, Bollinger PN, comprises single-cru and single-vintage Pinot Noir wines produced from the estate’s vineyards, with each release dedicated to a specific village.