We have never heard so much French spoken in this countryside of Kent, a county located southeast of London, with green, hilly horizons dotted with Norman country houses and churches. On September 26, the Taittinger family and the directors of the prestigious champagne house of the same name traveled in full to the heights of the town of Chilham, a few kilometers from Canterbury. There are Pierre-Emmanuel, the father, his daughter Vitalie, to whom he handed over the management of the house, the financial director and dozens of partners, bankers, diplomats, French wine specialists and sector experts. sparkling (“bubbly”) English.
All these beautiful people are gathered under a radiant sun, at the entrance of a brand new winery that looks like a luxury spa. In front of them, wherever the eye can see, stretch nearly 60 hectares of vineyards that make up the new Domaine Evremond. Taittinger is the first champagne house to embark on an adventure on the other side of the English Channel, where, thanks to global warming, the vines are becoming increasingly better acclimatised. In 2015, he acquired this land, until then covered in apple trees, and planted it with Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Meunier, the queen grape varieties of Champagne. The first harvests were made five years ago.
This September day, the house tastes its first Classic Cuvée, contained in a bulging bottle with a pretty forest green neck. “The drink comes 80% from the 2020 harvest and 20% from 2019,” says Patrick McGrath, wine merchant, old friend of the Taittinger family, who has overseen Domaine Evremond since its inception. “Health!” » : Everyone toasts the health of the vineyard, including Sofia, Duchess of Edinburgh, wife of Edward, younger brother of King Charles III, who has come to honor the event with her royal presence. In March 2025, one hundred thousand bottles of Domaine Evremond will be sold, exclusively in the United Kingdom, for the considerable sum of £50 (€60) each. Taittinger claims to be there for a long time and aims to increase its production to 300,000 or 400,000 bottles a year.
“The wine is fine, elegant, has energy and transparency, we recognize the Taittinger signature, but it has nothing to do with champagne.” assures Pierre-Henry Gagey, one of the most important names in Burgundy, former president of the Louis Jadot house, now associated with the Evremond project. However, everything about this drink is reminiscent of Champagne: the vines, obviously, the terrain with a strikingly similar geology (chalk with flint veins) and the winemaking method (three years of maturation for a sparkling white wine).
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