Nicolas Maillart

Nicolas Maillart is the ninth-generation Champagne grower-producer at the family domaine in Écueil, on the Montagne de Reims roughly halfway between Reims and Épernay. The family's first vigneron is recorded in 1753; Nicolas - an engineer-oenologist by training - returned to take over the domaine in 2003.

The estate works seventeen hectares, all in Premier Cru and Grand Cru villages on the Montagne. Most plantings are in Villers-Allerand, a 132-hectare north-facing 1er Cru that has stayed quietly under the radar; Maillart has built a remarkable lieu-dit programme there with three Pinot Noirs, two Meuniers, and a rare pure Petit Meslier. Other parcels sit in Écueil itself (including Les Coupés, planted franc de pied in 1973 by Nicolas's father Michel - one of Champagne's vanishingly few ungrafted vineyards) and a slice of Bouzy Grand Cru.

In the cellar: every parcel and vintage vinified separately, careful selection at harvest, controlled yields, low dosage, partial oak fermentation on the top cuvées. The site work is the spine of the house style - Maillart treats his Premier Cru parcels more like Burgundian climats than like Champagne reserve fodder.