Beaujolais Spotlight Case

From a high-altitude vineyard, this tastes more like a Côte de Brouilly with its intense, brambly fruit character and silky texture. Attractive, well-priced cru Beaujolais from a great, classic and fresh vintage.

A member favourite for many years, this is copybook, perfumed Fleurie delivering plenty of supple, ripe fruit. Perfect with roast chicken and other fowl. The Montengeron family have their vines close to the border with Morgon and their Fleurie needs a year in bottle to show at its best. It comes from a number of different vineyard parcels (Chamilles, Champagne and Rochaux) that all lie mid-slope (generally regarded as the best spot for vines), on sandy soils.

With bags of vibrant, fresh gamay character from an excellent producer with vines close to Juliénas, this versatile estate-bottled Beaujolais is more structured and firm in the cooler 2024 vintage than the preceding year, with black cherry fruit and aromas of violet and black pepper. Emeringes is a village perched above Juliénas and its vines, often laid out on steep slopes, offer a good source of Villages-quality Beaujolais. The château itself is at the top of the village, next to the church where Pierre David uses the cellars to make his wines.

A joyful, energetic Beaujolais Villages, made with 50/50 whole bunch and destemmed fruit, which is bursting with ripe berries and cherries, with a herbal sappy edge and a fragrant peppery-spice character. A lovely follow-on from the 2023 vintage, which was the first vintage at The Society, this is more mineral in its expression, with powdery tannins and a tangy freshness. Jean-Baptiste Bachevillier is a young grower who does all the vineyard work himself, farming just under five hectares of vines now with organic and agroforestry-inspired methods. While he is the eighth generation of his family to make wine, he is the first since 1873 to own his vines – something he achieved before he was 30!

Domaine les Garçons is one of the most exciting new domaines in Beaujolais, founded in 2022 by fifth-generation grape grower Loïc Crespin and his partner Fabien Pinguet. This energetic pair began by taking over the management of Loïc’s parents’ vineyards, converting them to organic and then biodynamic and selling the fruit, before taking the step to bottle their own wine. Demeter certified since 2018 (one of very few certified biodynamic producers in Beaujolais), they are now farming seven hectares in total, between just the two of them. This is the second vintage of their Beaujolais-Villages and it’s a beauty, ably demonstrating the potential of the appellation when produced with quality in mind, rather than quantity. Made with 25% whole bunches (the rest destemmed) and semi-carbonic maceration, this exudes wild-strawberry and dried-herb perfume and has bright, pure red fruit on the palate and a little peppery spice on the finish. Fine, detailed tannins, with such vitality, freshness and finesse. We are delighted to bring this new grower to our members.

Antoine Sunier is the younger brother of Julien Sunier, and in the last ten years has followed in his brother's footsteps and established himself as one of Beaujolais's leading growers. Having been inspired by visits to Julien, Antoine managed to buy a few hectares of vines in Régnié in 2014 and now farms 5.5 hectares in this cru and a further 1.2 hectares in Morgon, all organically. Gamay Poursuite is a wonderful and delicious introduction to the pure and fine wines he makes and while labelled as a Beaujolais-Villages is in fact declassified Régnié (from his younger vines). Light and crunchy, with juicy strawberry and raspberry fruit, this is perfect summer drinking, gently chilled alongside alfresco picnics and the like!