We recently conducted the first interview in a series on Sauternes wines and wine tourism in the Sauternes region. Our exclusive interview with David Bolzan, General Manager of Vignobles Silvio Denz highlights the Sauternes wines from the 1st Grand Cru Classé in 1855 of Château Lafaurie-Peyraguey.
SUnder the impetus of owner Silvio Denz, a new collaboration was born between Château Lafaurie-Peyraguey, a jewel of Sauternes, and the Lalique crystal factory, a flagship of Art Deco. Two icons of French heritage have come together. This 1er Grand Cru Classé château already had quality and nobility; Lalique has added elegance and refinement.
Starting with the 2013 vintage, René Lalique's 1928 "Woman and Grapes" design appears as an engraving on all glass bottles of this magnificent vintage. This engraving, in molded-pressed white glass on a silver background, was nestled in the woodwork of the sleeping cars of the "Côte d'Azur Pullman-Express" (Orient-Express), which entered service in 1929. For the holiday season, the estate is unveiling a limited edition in which the designer's engraving is adorned with gold. The empty bottles are sent to the Lalique factory in Alsace to be gilded and then return to the Château to be bottled in June of each year.
The gold application is carried out cold by stamping liquid gold onto the engraving using a foam developed in the Lalique workshops.
The bottle is kiln-fired overnight at 510°C to "enamelize" the gold into the glass. Each bottle is then hand-signed by a craftsman from the factory. The alliance between Lalique and Château Lafaurie-Peyraguey is a marriage of French know-how and savoir-vivre, a fusion of Sauternes gold and Alsatian excellence.
A hundred bottles, a limited and numbered series starting with the 2016 vintage, will go on sale in the last quarter of 2019. This creation follows that of the Lalique barrel, a true work of art which now lies dormant in the Château's cellars, filled with Chateau Lafaurie-Peyraguey 2013, first vintage of the Silvio Denz era.
By Emmanuel Lupé
Photos copyrighted and provided free of charge by Château Lafaurie-Peyraguey.
