How to start a winery: a masterclass by Etienne Calsac

As we are forever eager to point out, winemaking in Champagne is almost always a family business, passed from generation to generation to sons and daughters who’ve been groomed from a young age to eat, sleep and breathe the honor of making the world’s best Champagne. So, when they finally take over the family domaine, young vignerons inherit troves of tactic knowledge as well as their family’s vineyards, cellars and winemaking equipment. Etienne Calsac, however, inherited only his grandparents’ land. The rest has been a journey of his own making.

Etienne did not come from a family of winemakers, but as a boy growing up in Reims, the wine industry was all around him. His grandparents and great grandparents were grape growers who lived in Avize on the other side of the mountain south of Épernay. They sold their grapes to the grand maisons, a common practice throughout Champagne. While lucrative for both parties, the practice values quantity over quality, and, inevitably, unique character and a deep connection to the land is lost. To Etienne, selling off the family grapes never made sense.

“It is very frustrating to grow grapes and then you sell them to a big house or a big cooperative,” Etienne said. “It’s your work, and then you can do nothing with it.” 

Etienne entered wine school at the age of 14, and as time went on, he found himself thinking more and more about his grandparents’ vineyards in Avize. What if he could do the unimaginable? What if he could buy his family’s grapes, build a winery from scratch and make Champagne that reflected a reverence for the land as well as his own unique vision? These ideas stuck with Etienne until, finally, he was ready to make his dream a reality. 

Etienne inherited three hectares of vineyards from his grandparents, mostly in Avize and Grauves (pictured above.)

In 2010, a 26-year-old Etienne set out to create his own Champagne domaine with grapes from his family’s land. He moved from Reims to Avize, bought barrels and all the necessary Champagne-making  equipment and built a winery on Allée Augustin Lorite, just around the corner from vignerons Richard Petit and Véronique Bajan of fellow fatcork producer Petit Le Brun et Fils. With the winery building complete, Etienne took over the cultivation of his grandparents’ vineyards: three hectares of predominantly chardonnay in Avize and Grauves in the Côtes des Blancs, Bisseuil in the Grand Vallée de la Marne, Montgenost in La Côte Sézanne and Bligny in La Côte des Bars. 

“Good Champagne begins in the vineyard.” — Etienne Calsac

From the start, Etienne had a clear path forward. His approach would be grounded in a deeply rooted passion for his family land and its terroir. He went to work immediately, planting grass cover crops to protect the vineyard soil from erosion, add nutrients, control weeds and foster an overall healthy ecosystem. Etienne also began meticulously plowing his vineyards to aerate and maintain healthy, nutrient-rich soil. A champion of clean, natural farming, he worked tirelessly to achieve organic certification for his vineyards in 2020. 

Etienne’s vineyards are predominantly planted with chardonnay grapes, which grow particularly well in the chalky soil of the Côte de Blancs. As he got to know the vineyards, he also began experimenting with pinot noir as well as some older grape varieties, such as pinot blanc, arbanne and petit meslier.

“Réserve wines are part of the identity.” — Etienne Calsac

In the cellar, Etienne chose to allow malolactic fermentation, a type of fermentation that occurs naturally, in order to soften and add flavor complexity to his chardonnay wines that tend (even to this day) to be acidic and on the younger side. He also adopted his version of a solera system to “keep the memory of the previous vintages.” Etienne has two tanks of perpetual réserve wine — one that holds wine from each vintage in each of his plots, starting with 2011, and one that he added later that holds each new vintage from his Les Rocheforts plot in Bisseuil. Depending on the cuvée, each bottle Etienne produces holds 20-30 percent of réserve wine from these tanks. 

L'échappée Belle was the first cuvée to come from Etienne’s new domaine, and it continues to be his most popular. A blend of wines from each of his plots plus 30 percent réserve wine, L’échappée Belle is considered by Etienne to be his estate’s signature Champagne. 

“L'échappée Belle” is French for “The Great Escape,” and Etienne designed it as such. 

“When you start out, and you don’t know what to expect, it’s hard,” Etienne said. “But I like chardonnay, and for me L'échappée Belle had to be an accessible, easy-drinking blanc de blancs that opens the appetite and that you're happy to share. When you’re having a glass of L'échappée Belle, I want people to feel like they’re sharing a good moment.”

Another Etienne Calsac standout, Les Rocheforts Terroir de Bisseuil, came two years after L'échappée Belle. Etienne has a small, sunny plot in Bisseuil called Les Rocheforts just east of Épernay in the Grand Vallée de la Marne. Not to be confused with the larger Vallée de la Marne Champagne subregion, the Grand Vallée is a smaller area known for its warmer climate and chalky Kimmeridgian soil. At first, Etienne only blended his chardonnay from Les Rocheforts into L'échappée Belle. But, in 2013, he tasted the vin clair from Les Rocheforts and thought it would do well as a single-vineyard cuvée. And he was right. Over the years, the single-vineyard Les Rocheforts has become popular with sommeliers and Champagne collectors and enthusiasts around the world. 

In Champagne, most growers sell the grapes they grow to the big houses, but, thankfully, Etienne had other plans. In choosing to build a winery and to make Champagne with grapes from his family’s land, he is able to express its unique character with clarity and precision. The result is Champagne that feels personal, thoughtful and deeply connected to its terroir.

Are you ready to try the brilliantly fresh and easy-drinking L'échappée Belle and the rich, flavorful Les Rocheforts Terroir de Bisseuil? Each year, Etienne sends us a small allocation of both of these highly-coveted cuvées. Pop into the tasting room or visit fatcork’s online shop to give them a try.