CHANDON has launched its super-prestige cuvée, Étoile, crafted from a library of remarkable CHANDON Vintage Brut sparkling wines.
Étoile is a toast to the rarefied art of blending and sets a new benchmark in Australian luxury sparkling wine.
Twenty-five years ago, our winemaking director Dan Buckle, had a first taste of the great wines of the world he had hitherto only dreamed of. The finesse and complexity opened a new vista of what was possible.
Étoile realises a 25-year dream: to create a sparkling cuvée of unrivalled quality and to place Australia firmly at the international table of super-prestige sparkling wine.
Étoile is the ultimate expression of CHANDON: an ambitious passion project that redefines Australian luxury.
A multi-vintage composition based on eight CHANDON Vintage Brut reserves, together representing hundreds of base wines and rounded out with extended ageing. It reflects the ceaseless quest of our community of past and current winemakers to create the most exceptional sparkling wines.
“With Étoile, we are shooting for the stars. The expression of excitement and recognition in people when you pour exceptional wine for them is so rewarding for a winemaker; I have seen the lights go on in people’s eyes when they taste a truly great wine for the first time. That’s what happened to me all those years ago, and that’s what I wanted to create with this wine,” said Buckle.
With Étoile, CHANDON set out to break the rules. The winemaker wanted to buck the trend for specificity – wines from a single vintage, variety, or parcel.
Although these wines can be undoubtedly delicious and yield some fascinating insights, Étoile considers the wealth of what can be achieved when we are free of the limitations of these singularities. By focusing on the blend, we have crafted a finely tuned cuvée with no rough edges that shine like a polished gem.
This is about balance, length of palate and complexity drawing from the art of blending.
Every year – with the exception of 2000 and 2020 – CHANDON has released a Vintage Brut, its flagship wine. O
“The wine tells the story of the years. We have the ultra-cool season of 2005; the blast of heat that was 2009, which was followed by a cooler autumn. The lovely 2012 season, which built slowly and gently through March into April, with an ideal autumn – low twenties in the daytime with colder nights,” Buckle added.
“The hotter 2013 season, which was a flurry of harvest. The 2014 was concentrated, with low yields; we’ve used a small amount of this vintage to contribute a subtle richness. The wonderful 2015 season – again cool, and longer, with extremely delicate results. And then the hotter 2016 – a glow of sunshine and warm days.”
Étoile is absolutely and resolutely Australian. Its guiding principle is to capture poise, elegance and finesse from fruit purity, rather than seeking heavy autolytic flavours, and yeasty notes in the Old-World mode.
The overall impression is of subtle, seamless layers of complexity from age, using time on lees to support its fruit with a light hand, without overwhelming it.