One of my favorite people to sit down and have a glass of champagne with is Dom Pérignon’s head wine maker, the doctor turned Chef de Cave Richard Geoffroy. He’s a magician, a poet and a man deeply passionate about the quirks of the land and the grapes it…
Continue Reading…
We talk to the filmmaker about his foray into Champagne
Spending an afternoon with David Lynch in the penthouse of the Chateau Marmont isn’t necessarily an everyday occurrence—the filmmaker, known for his surrealistic visions, actually admits that he rarely leaves the house if he doesn’t have to. As the son of a forester, Lynch grew up spending time with his father in their woodshop, and now enjoys time at home creating his own art, photography and sound studios.
Lynch did venture out recently to the home of his friend, special effects designer Gary D’Amico, to collaborate on a bottle and package design project for Dom Pérignon. The two experimented with welding torches, shot beams of light into crystals, sprinkled sparkles and powered up smoke machines and other lighting effects to capture images for the resulting wraps. Shrouded in dreamy, glowing light streaks is Lynch’s scrawled label, “Dom Pérignon by David Lynch” sliced horizontally across the dark Champagne bottle.
We asked Lynch for insight into his growing interest in collaboration, and what inspires his work.
I always say commercial work is money and a chance to do something, a chance to experiment. A lot of times a chance to experiment with the latest technologies. So I always learn something and feel really good about the result and the experimentation and the process of getting that result. It is a collaboration in a way, but I really like the things where I have a freedom to experiment. Obviously the client has to like the result. This idea of experimenting to get something was embraced by Dom Pérignon. Luckily it turned out good.
It’s a special occasion, but like I say, I learned a lot about what goes into Dom Pérignon. So now when I take a drink, it is a very rich experience.
There are a lot of great DPs out in the world. There are a lot of great painters. A lot of times you will see something and it will be very inspiring. There might be a painter where 90% of the stuff doesn’t talk to you but 10% really talks to you. Inspirations can come from so many places. I always say my greatest inspiration came from the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. So many reasons, the mood of the place, the architecture, what I saw and heard and felt. It was very magical, but laced with a deep tormenting fear and sickness. And I ate many steak sandwiches there.
Lynch’s designs for the Dom Pérignon Vintage 2003 and Dom Pérignon Rosé Vintage 2000 will be available on 1 October 2012.
The world’s preeminent brand of bubbly launches their most intense vintage to date
The summer of 2003 was blistering hot in France, only to be followed by an extreme winter and harsh spring filled with unusual frosts that destroyed a majority of the Côte des Blancs Chardonnay crop. While this doesn’t sound ideal to anyone, such conditions are even more peril when your business is producing vintage Champagne. Thanks to the inclement weather that year, no house could produce a solid vintage, except of course, the masterminds at Dom Pérignon‘s Abbaye d’Hautvillers.
Launched today, Dom Pérignon’s vintage 2003 tastes like the marvel that it was to yield. Cellar master Richard Geoffroy describes it as “a duality between restraint and expression,” but above all for him this particular vintage speaks to their deep-rooted philosophy and commitment to the brand’s legacy. “There was never the slightest doubt that we would produce a vintage that year,” he explained via satellite at the NYC premiere. Making high-quality Champagne is at the very heart of what Dom Pérignon does, and they saw this challenge as a test of their greatness—one they haven’t endured since producing another of Geoffroy’s favorites, the vintage ’76.
The perfectly balanced 2003 is the upshot of a powerful tension between the white and black grapes. The vintage has character, but remains quintessentially Dom Pérignon with a round, rhythmical finish that dances delicately between mineral and floral flavors. To the skilled chef de cave, the 2003 is an intense memory, and Geoffroy beautifully captures this by saying, “I wish every single vintage could be as strong as 2003.”
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
