A family-owned House since 1829
Founded in Aÿ, Bollinger has never been sold and still belongs to its founding family, a rarity among the great Champagne houses. This continuity explains the consistency of its style and the House's ability to think in the long term, particularly in its cellar ageing times and its reserve stocks.
Lily Bollinger and the legacy of La Grande Année
At the helm of the House from 1941 to 1971, Lily Bollinger built its international reputation and created the cuvée La Grande Année, which remains the House's benchmark vintage expression.
Which Bollinger champagne should you choose?
To discover the House
Special Cuvée is the natural entry point into the range. A non-vintage Brut dominated by Pinot Noir, it bears the signature of the House: fine bubbles, notes of pear and fresh walnut, and a spicy touch on the finish. It is also the most versatile cuvée. It can be enjoyed at any time, and even at the table alongside shellfish, fish or even white meats.
For the dining table
The Extra Bruts and La Grande Année were designed to accompany a meal. Long ageing and vinification in barrels give them the substance, depth and length needed to stand up to a dish. The lower dosages also allow for better harmony with food.
For Pinot Noir lovers (and terroir enthusiasts)
The PN collection explores the grape variety cru by cru, in a parcel-by-parcel approach that is rare in Champagne. Each edition highlights a dominant terroir. Tasted side by side, they reveal the differences between Aÿ, Tauxières and Verzenay.
For the cellar and long-term ageing
The RD Récemment Dégorgé and the La Côte aux Enfants cuvées make up the rare end of the range, sought after for their ageing potential and limited availability. Precious bottles!
For gifting
All Bollinger cuvées make wonderful gifts that will delight any enthusiast. Generally speaking, Special Cuvée is a safe choice when it comes to giving champagne. Available in a wide variety of formats, from the standard bottle to very large formats, Special Cuvée is also often the focus of limited editions, particularly for the festive season.
Bollinger cuvées explained
Special Cuvée
A non-vintage Brut and the heart of the House's range. Its ageing on lees far exceeds the appellation minimums, and its reserve wines are kept in magnums. These two choices give rise to a depth unusual for a non-vintage and a consistency that few entry-level Bruts achieve.
Brut Rosé
Brut Rosé is a blend of Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Meunier, completed with the House's own red wine. Its colour has coppery highlights, with redcurrant and wild strawberry notes extended by the characteristic spicy touch. This vinous, gastronomic rosé, rather than a light one, is representative of the expertise of Bollinger in rosé champagnes, the pinnacle of which is La Grande Année Rosé.
La Grande Année
A cuvée created by Lily Bollinger, it expresses exceptional vintages. Vinified entirely in old barrels, La Grande Année spends eight years on lees, which fosters autolytic aromas that lend the wine a patina, with notes of dried fruit and its recognisable texture. Still riddled and disgorged by hand today, Bollinger's La Grande Année is one of the monuments of Champagne and also exists in a rosé version.
PN, the Blanc de Noirs
Pinot Noir is Bollinger's emblematic grape variety! The PN cuvées are Blanc de Noirs that embody the ambition to explore all of its facets. Each edition starts with a blank page. The House selects the year's most representative cru through blind tasting, then blends it with other crus and other vintages to enhance it, ensuring that the main cru remains the majority. No edition replicates the previous one.
How to read the name of a PN cuvée: It is a non-vintage Brut. The letters indicate the dominant cru: AYC for Aÿ, TX for Tauxières, VZ for Verzenay. The number indicates the base year of the blend, not a vintage.
Bollinger B, the limited editions
The By Bollinger series follows the opposite logic to that of La Grande Année. Where the latter adheres to a strict framework, the B cuvées break free from any terroir constraint. They have only been produced on rare occasions, making them the most confidential bottles in the range. A Grande Année and a B cuvée never coexist in the same vintage.
Example with B16: The 2016 vintage did not bring together Aÿ or Verzenay in the required proportions, and had only about ten crus at the expected quality level. Rather than produce a watered-down Grande Année, the House tightened the blend and explored more unusual terroirs: 73% Pinot Noir and 27% Chardonnay from the latest-ripening sectors of the Montagne de Reims, mainly Verzy, Verzenay, Tauxières and a little Bouzy, with a Chardonnay from Trépail rather than the Côte des Blancs. Remarkably, the blend contains no fruit from Aÿ, which would be unthinkable for La Grande Année.
RD for Récemment Dégorgé
A Grande Année of the same vintage, left on lees for much longer before late disgorgement. After fourteen or fifteen years, the dosage is determined by blind tasting, generally below 5 g/l, the acquired complexity then providing the balance. The aromatic evolution shifts from an autolytic profile towards a more oxidative one. The House does not systematically release its vintages as RD: only those it believes will benefit from additional ageing are chosen.
La Côte aux Enfants
La Côte aux Enfants is a historic parcel of the House in Aÿ, farmed directly by Bollinger. It yields a Blanc de Noirs classified as grand cru and, in certain years only, one of the rare still red wines of Champagne, under the Coteaux Champenois appellation.
What defines the style of Bollinger champagnes
Pinot Noir as the signature grape variety
Since its foundation, the House has built its identity around Pinot Noir. It dominates almost all of the blends and gives the wines their breadth, their vinous structure and their length on the palate.
Vinification in wood, never in new barrels
While most houses have adopted stainless steel, which is easier to manage in bacteriological and thermal terms, Bollinger has kept wood since 1829. Only barrels that have already seen several years of use are employed, as new wood would mask the delicate aromas of these champagnes. The time in barrel lasts six to eight months, and it is from this very slow micro-oxygenation that the creamy effervescence unique to the House is born.
Reserve wines aged in magnum
A significant share of the reserve wines is aged in magnum, under wood, for between seven and fifteen years. Integrated into a young blend, they bring an immediate patina, notes of dried and candied fruit, and a complexity the wine would not have achieved on its own. The practice is rare in Champagne, because of the volume of stock it ties up.
The pursuit of fruit maturity
Maison Bollinger assesses the maturity of the fruit on a scale ranging from Granny Smith apple to overripe apple, aiming for the upper end of the spectrum without ever reaching it: white fruits, fleshy fruits, sometimes hints of tropical fruit. Neither greenness nor overripeness.
Dosage decided blind
Blends and dosages are determined in blind tastings, seeking the best organoleptic balance specific to each cuvée.
Riddling and disgorging by hand
A team of riddlers and disgorgers works the bottles by hand, a practice that has become rare among the great houses. It makes it possible to smell each wine just before recorking and to check for faults bottle by bottle.
Cellar ageing two and a half times the minimum
The wines rest in the cellar well beyond what the appellation requires. It is this long ageing that explains the texture, the aromatic patina and the ageing potential of the cuvées.
The crus of the Bollinger vineyards
The House farms six historic crus, five in Pinot Noir and one in Chardonnay. The Chardonnay comes from Cuis, at the very northern end of the Côte des Blancs. The Pinot Noirs are spread around the Montagne de Reims: Verzenay in the north, then Louvois, Avenay, Tauxières and Aÿ.
Verzenay and Bollinger's salinity
Verzenay holds a special place. The House owns about thirty hectares there, exclusively grand cru, which bring drinkability and above all the salinity regarded as the true signature of Bollinger. This salinity can be found from one cuvée to the next and forms the common thread of the style.
Aÿ, birthplace of the House
Aÿ has been home to the House since 1829, as well as to the La Côte aux Enfants parcel. The cru is among the requirements for a vintage to qualify as La Grande Année.
