Champagne Labruyère

The history of the Labruyère Family started in 1850, when the founder of the Macon family branch, Jean-Marie, settles down in Les Thorins, which became part of the Moulin-à-Vent appellation in 1924. Since then, every generation has contributed to the preservation and the development of this viticultural treasure. Jean-Pierre Labruyère, President of Labruyère Eberlé Group for more than 30 years, passed the reins of the estate to his son Edouard in 2008, in order to create a leading winery in the appellation.
Meanwhile two other chapters of the Labruyères wine history had been written. 

In 1988, Jean-Pierre Labruyère took over the control of the prestigious Domaine Jacques Prieur with a group of investors, to protect this Burgundian jewel. And in 1992, Jean-Pierre becomes the first Burgundian owner to invest in Bordeaux as he acquired 18 hectares of the best terroirs in Pomerol; it was a new start for Château Rouget. 

In 2012 the Labruyère family decided to complete its mosaic of terroirs with vineyards in Verzenay, a Champagne Grand Cru village renowned for its Pinot Noir. Owning all our vineyards, we are able to master each stage in the wine-growing and winemaking processes with terroir, tradition and the excellence, being our core values.

In tribute to his ancestor who preceded him by six generations, Edouard decided to name this new domaine, J.M. Labruyère.
The origin of the estate goes back to the 1820, the year when its beautiful cellars were built, and the first bottles saw daylight in 1863. Several families owned the property and vineyards on exceptional Grand Cru terroirs during the 20th century and in 2012 they made a choice to entrust the keys of their wine jewel to another family of vine growers from Burgundy: Labruyère. Today the entire team is dedicated to bringing the domaine among Grower's Champagne elite by combining traditions, sustainable agriculture, haute-couture vinification, Burgundian know-how and vineyard designated approach to let each terroir show itself.

Champagne vineyard represents 320 grape-growing villages with only 17 ranked Grand Cru for the quality of their grapes. Champagne JM Labruyere is lucky to own vineyards in one of these amazing terroirs: Verzenay. In 1873, an unofficial ranking placed Verzenay among the top three Crus in Champagne.  

Montagne de Reims influences and protects the terroir of Verzenay renowned for its Pinot Noir, giving our champagne an exceptional character, structure and ageing potential.
The hillsides of Verzenay were recognized as World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

The grape harvest is always manual, and the sorting is made with precaution directly in the vineyard in order to select only the healthy bunches before being transported to the estate to be pressed directly. We pick the grapes later that many other vine growers to obtain base wines with balance approaching our Burgundy wines. 

Pressing is carried out in a very gentle and progressive way to get the highest quality juice. Thanks to the fractioning of marc we can separate the cuvée, the most qualitative must used for our assemblages, from all other phases of pressing. Les tailles, the first and the last presses are not used for J.M. Labruyère Champagne.

We press and vinify separately each parcel to respect the identity of each terroir. That enables us to have a very significant pallet of choice during the assemblages. All our base wines are going through malolactic fermentation before the rest phase. 

Later, often in January, the team meets to define assemblages (blends) of the base wines of the last harvest and the reserve wines. Our philosophy, influenced by Burgundy and Bordeaux, tends towards an expression of each vintage which composes our champagne wines. 
This is how our cuvées are created: Prologue (classical Grand Cru blend with dominant Pinon Noir), Anthologie (Grand Cru rosé d'assemblage) and Page Blanche (Blanc de Blancs Grand Cru). Usually they are bottled in the spring following the harvest to give way to their second fermentation (prise de mousse). 

To get the finest bubble, an important vinosity and aromatic complexity, the aging process "sur lattes" takes between 3 and 5 years, and up to 10 years for millésime champagnes. 
At disgorgement we chose to work with low dosage and our best wines for the liqueur, to produce perfectly ripe and balanced terroir-driven wines.