Les Rugiens

One third of Les Rugiens undergoes whole-cluster vinification. Medium to deep purple, the nose is laden with ripe, cherry fruit and only a touch of spice. Very appealing, there is a huge wealth of fruit on the palate, spectacular quality and lovely, fine-grained tannins. This shows the nobility of the terroir, with no indications of hail.

Étienne de Montille began picking whites on 10th and reds on 13th September, relatively early. Despite the hail (worst in Pommard than Beaune, Volnay less) yields were slightly improved compared to 2013. The fruit was clean with small berries, and beautiful clusters, so they were able to continue with their usual programme of whole-bunch vinification in most instances. The details are given for each wine. They will be long lived wines.

The Faiveley team managed to make an acceptable volume of this superb Pommard. It impresses from its very attractive purple colour onwards, but especially on the palate where the huge weight of fruit covers up the typically firm structure of Pommard. It is exceptionally persistent too.
Jasper Morris MW, Burgundy Wine Director

The new era at Faiveley is now into its sixth vintage and the house style, which allows the fruit to express itself in a very seductive manner while enhancing the individual qualities of each terroir, has been safely established. Now the management is concentrating on reinforcing their supplybase with some crafty contracts and vineyard purchases in both Côte de Beaune and Côte de Nuits. We may be able to offer more cuvées in the future, and though opportunities are clearly limited by the 2012 vintage circumstances, we have been well looked after this year.

Glowing a lovely purple colour, this wine has a really refined nose for Pommard, excellent weight on the palate and good grip. The balance of tannins and fruit has been judged just right. This is excellent wine from a great vineyard.
Jasper Morris MW, Berrys' Burgundy Director The resurgence begun by the trio of Erwan Faiveley, Bernard Hervé and winemaker Jérôme Flous, who arrived in 2007, is very apparent in this brilliant series of 2011 wines. They began the harvest on 31 August and picked for 9 days. There are some new wines this year from a contract for the whole production of an estate in Chambolle-Musigny and the Faiveley white wines from totally healthy grapes are particularly successful in 2011, perhaps the best we have seen from the new regime.

---

Displaying fractionally more colour than the other Pommards and with a notable intensity of fruit from the start, this is a really fine wine. It begins gracefully, moves into the sumptuous, bursting with ripe cherries, before stretching out marvellously to a long silky finish.
Jasper Morris MW, Burgundy Director

Domaine de Montille picked between the 18th and 26th September in 2010. The red wines, made by American Brian Sieve (one of two winemakers in this catalogue born in Indianapolis!) under the surveillance of Etienne de Montille, now show a consistency of style and quality that perhaps was not entirely there a few years ago. The whites are the responsibility of Etienne’s sister Alix and maintain the class of recent times. Together they have produced a fine result in 2010.

The de Montille holding is in the favoured, lower part of this vineyard. Bright pink-purple in colour, with richer, ripe fruit here, delivering a great intensity of dense red flavours. The tannins are prominent, as they should be for Rugiens, but not discordant. This is for the long term.
Jasper Morris MW, Burgundy Wine Director

This great domaine has grown even further with the acquisition of some vineyards, such as Meursault Perrières, to enhance the white wine range, vinified by Alix de Montille. The reds continue the progress seen in recent years from the team led by Etienne de Montille with the assistance of cellarmaster Brian Sieve. All the top wines are vinified with 100% whole bunches which defines the very perfumed style of the domaine’s wines

Marco has more than one barrel of his flagship wine for the first time in several years – four to be precise, allowing a diminution of the new wood percentage  to 25 percent. Famously from vines over 100 years  old and, astonishingly, providing over 40hl/ha this year. The wine oozes with the silky texture of oldvine fruit, and there is 25 percent whole-bunch to complement the vineyard’s iron-rich contribution. Drink 2025-2031.

As he felt that the tannins were riper than in 2016, Marc-Olivier (Marco) looked for greater extraction just at the start of the fermentation but, other than that, there are no major changes. Marco still uses whole-bunch when he feels it can improve the wine’s texture. Harvest started on 5th September and was finished by 15th September. He is another winemaker losing interest in zero-sulphur, feeling that the identity of the terroir can be lost without SO2’s guiding hand.