A. Leconte

Alexis Leconte started his own label in 2015, A. Leconte, and put his first name on it, at least as an initial. He builds on a line of Leconte growers in Troissy that runs back to 1861, through Onésime, Jules and Henri to his grandfather Aimé and his father Xavier. The family estate still sells Champagne under Xavier's name.

The property began in 1870 with a single hectare on steep slopes. Today the family vineyard covers 10 hectares in 40 plots across Troissy, Dormans, Mareuil-le-Port, Vandières and Aÿ. Every plot has been mapped geologically, and the soils run through clays, limestones, marls and sands of several ages.

Meunier has been part of the estate from the start, propagated by massal selection. Pinot Noir and Chardonnay get the same plot-by-plot treatment, each vineyard managed by its age, geology, exposure and natural humidity.

Alexis's own wines are farmed biodynamically and certified organic, and he follows the lunar calendar for racking and bottling. In the cellar he settles the juice slowly, keeping the fine lees. His wines ferment on indigenous yeasts in 400-litre barrels, without stirring and without malolactic. The range covers Champagnes such as Aria, Ageius, La Terre Mère and Totem, still Troissy red and white, ratafia from each of the three grapes, and a fine champenoise.

For generations the Lecontes grew grapes. Xavier went independent in 1980 and built his first press. A generation later, his son put his own first name on a label.