Among grower Champagne aficionados, Pierre Gimonnet’s cuvées are coveted for how purely they express the richness allied with elegance of Chardonnay from the Côte des Blancs.

And the richest of the domaine’s Champagnes is Cuvée Fleuron, a vintage-dated Blanc de Blancs based on Gimonnet’s old Chardonnay vines in the Grand Cru of Chouilly.

The 2009 is Gimonnet’s finest Fleuron to date. Radiantly full-bodied and creamy, yet fresh and nuanced, it is a complete Blanc de Blancs and one of the great Champagnes of this historically ripe year.  

Master of Assemblage

Keys to the 2009 Fleuron’s fabulous character are great terroirs and Didier Gimonnet’s superlative blending skill. The domaine is blessed with 28 hectares of vines—more than two-thirds of them at least 40-years-old—spread across the great villages of Cramant, Chouilly, Oger, Cuis and Vertus. 

But this incredible matière première would mean little without Didier’s magic touch. As richly concentrated and textured as the 2009 Fleuron is, it is wonderfully balanced, its full-bodied voluptuousness underpinned by the trademark Gimonnet “precision, purity and minerality.”                      

This is due to Didier’s masterful ability to marry different terroirs into a spherically harmonious whole. The 2009 Fleuron assemblage was based on the richness of Chouilly, the concentrated delicacy of Cramant, the stony minerality of Oger and the bracing freshness of Cuis.

Each lot was gently pressed, fermented separately in stainless steel and allowed to go through malolactic fermentation to enhance the fruit’s inherent richness. Once blended and bottled for the secondary fermentation, the 2009 Fleuron aged for five years en tirage before being disgorged and finished with a minimal 4.5 g/l dosage.

All of this makes the 2009 Fleuron one of Champagne’s richest, yet wonderfully balanced, Blanc de Blancs, courtesy of singular terroirs and singular skill in blending them.