Perfection for your delectation Champagne PommeryÀ Reims-France
Perfection for your delectation: Pommery celebrates 150 years of Brut Champagne
Champagne house Vranken Pommery Monopole is our time-honoured partner and this esteemed producer is once more supporting this year’s edition of the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este. Few other champagne marques have exerted such a profound impact on the heritage of champagne as Pommery. In 1858, Madame Pommery took over the wine-growing estate in Reims from her husband Louis-Alexandre Pommery and forged new approaches to the production of champagne. She launched a revolution by inventing brut champagne, which was to transform all previous standards for ever.
When viewed through a historical prism, champagne used to have a much sweeter taste. But in 1874, Madame Pommery tasked her cellar masters Olivier Damas and Victor Lambert with developing a dry sparkling wine using the traditional method. Her aim was to bring out the quality and taste of the grapes to create a superlative product.
The year 2024 marks the 150th anniversary of Brut Champagne from the Domaine Pommery. The 10th cellar master of the Domaine, Clément Pierlot, is taking this special anniversary as an opportunity to follow in the footsteps of his famous predecessors and create the Brut of the 21st century.
For the Apanage Brut 1874 the Maison’s Réserve Perpétuelle was systematised. The result is a cuvée of different vintages, the majority of which comes from the magnificent Millésime 2018, followed by a delicate touch of 2015 and 2012, which characterises the originality of Apanage Brut 1874.
This exceptional cuvée is matured for 48 months in the chalk cellars of the Butte Saint-Nicaise and has a contemporary, dry and precise style thanks to a low dosage. The Apanage Brut 1874 combines freshness and tension with salinity and minerality thanks to its flavours and stimulating structure. Various nuances such as sweetness, bitterness and umami reinterpret the flavour of a brut champagne in a variety of ways.
A pale-yellow hue with golden highlights enchants the eye. The first impression is of a bewitching bouquet of white flowers. This subtle harmony is supported by notes of ripe citrus fruits such as Sorrento lemon. These refreshing aromas gradually open up to more complex, toasty flavours of acacia honey, marshmallow and brioche.
After a smooth, delicately buttery attack, this champagne reveals notes of white nectarines, balanced by elegant freshness and the natural minerality of the terroirs from which it is made. The heart of the tasting, with its velvety texture, expresses the richness of the flavours and the complexity of the layers in the blend. The finish is full-bodied and long-lasting, enhanced by notes of citrus zest which round off the panoply of flavours.
