The best and only the best could be the Franck Bonville house and family's motto, settled in Avize for four generations. Managing the domain since 1996, Olivier equipped a cellar to work by plot. Fond of Grand Cru Chardonnay, the wine grower from Avize crafts grand white Champagnes!
Aged 40 with a short beard, Olivier is in control of the 12-hectare family domain that is in contrast with his neighbours. He works one and only grape variety, the Chardonnay, 100% classed Grand Cru. All the villages it consists of are situated in the Côte des Blancs area. His domain exists out if 6 ha in Avize (heart of the production and address of the head office since 1937), 5 ha at Oger, 2 ha at Mesnil-sur-Oger, 1,5 ha more recently, and at last 1 ha at Cramant. A specificity, all these lands from North to South are contiguous.
More than a simple expression of the terroir, the Franck Bonville wines combine the crus previously stated according to their characteristics: “Cramant is source of powerfulness, Avize provides the fruitiness and roundness, Mesnil-sur-Oger the minerality, Oger finesse and sharpness”, Olivier confides.
The home-grown man, graduate from Avize Viti Campus and trained enology at the Reims University, goes daily in the vineyard, carries out sampling regularly, listens to the weather forecast hour after hour. He knows the slightest bit of his vineyard. He considers the excellence of his wines comes from the terroir and the knowledge he has of it, of his early plots, their different sun exposure, their situation. Thanks to his sound farming methods—no weedkillers nor insecticide, minimum treatments—his vineyard has been certified of High Environmental Value this year!
“I have 77 plots of land, I cannot separate them all, but we created a good system to treat the harvest with.” Since 2012, the year of a very good crop, “I vinified separately the 'hearts' of the cuvées of the three terroirs of Avize, Oger and Mesnil-sur-Oger. I produced 2,500 bottles of each terroir.” They all have cork stoppers and will be released only in 2018!
Only one plot is currently vinified separately, it is called Les Belles Voyes, single vineyard varietal wines, with no dosage, that ferments in 2.25-hl oak vats. “It is the first cuvée I created in 1998, marketed in 2010, it now meets great success!”
For the six other Champagnes, at the press, he separates the first pressing juices (cuvées) from the second ones (tailles). He carries out the two fermentations in stainless steel vats then racks the wine, cools it, filters and leaves it to rest for two months before blending. Then comes ageing for four years in bottles and six months after disgorgement.
The cuvée Brut, 100% Chardonnay, is a blend of Grand Crus of 3 to 4 years of harvest (2009-2010-2011-2012 with 40% of the wines of the latest harvest). The cuvée Prestige is a blend of the best vats tasted during the blending. The Rosé consists of, like the Brut, a blend of 10% Grand Cru red wines bought (within the allowed 5%) from a friend, a wine grower in Ambonnay. The vintage Champagne is crafted with wine from Avize only—currently the 2010 crop—dosed at 6g/l; 5,000 bottles of the same vintage are kept non-dosed to be sold as very dry (Extra Brut). He also crafts a half-dry (Demi-Sec) Champagne dosed at 25g.
Olivier Bonville embodies a new generation of wine growers whose address is passed by word-of-mouth, who tries to produce even better wines. “What I love in this job, he confides, is the transmission, the continuity, the dependence on the weather conditions...”. His daughter is Camille, he has just created a cuvée in her name! But, shh, it has not been marketed yet...
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