We’ve gotten to the point in the Grower Champagne movement where the its core ideas are no longer revolutionary, but accepted practice. Names like Cedric Bouchard, Ulysse Collin and Jérôme Prévost are now firmly etched... Read More

We’ve gotten to the point in the Grower Champagne movement where the its core ideas are no longer revolutionary, but accepted practice. Names like Cedric Bouchard, Ulysse Collin and Jérôme Prévost are now firmly etched in super-stardom, and a whole second generation is starting out with those idols as mentors.

Enter Julien and Karine Prélat, from the small village of Celles-Sur-Ource in the Côte des Bar. If that village sounds familiar to you, it's because it is the home of their neighbor, friend, and mentor, Cedric Bouchard, of Roses de Jeanne fame. At the far southern end of Champagne, they live closer to Burgundy’s Chablis than to the vineyards of the Côte de Blancs, Montagne de Reims or Vallée de la Marne.

Like Cedric, Julien's primary goal is to make Champagne that clearly displays the place where it is grown. This means all wines are from a single vintage, single varietal, and single parcel, farmed with organic principles and extremely low yields, and picked very ripe for more phenolic flavor development, and to avoid dosage before bottling.

Julien took over his grandfather’s vines back in 2000 (the same year Cedric took some of his father's parcels over). He slowly applied more holistic approaches, but sold off his grapes all the while. Only recently did he apply lessons learned from Cedric, and began to vinify and bottle his own wines.