There’s little Graham Eunson hasn’t seen in his 30 years in the Scotch whisky industry. From pushing barrels at Scapa straight out of school to managing one of the biggest names, the Orcadian has worked in almost every production role at five Highland distilleries. Over the course of his career, the Tomatin Distillery Operations Director has been at the painful end of two consolidations and led the revival of a distillery lost for 22 years. For the past decade, he has had to pool all this knowledge and experience to bring a distillery that was once famed for mass production to single malt prominence. “I always say it’s the most fun I’ve had in the whisky industry,” he declares with a chuckle, “and I’ve loved every single one of the distilleries I’ve worked at.” Eunson talks with such fondness about the industry and all his colleagues that it’s easy to see why both his children have followed him into the profession. He refers to his route into the industry and progression through the ranks from mashman to stillman to brewer as the “old-fashioned way”. When Allied Distillers closed his first distillery during the 1990s whisky loch, Eunson faced a tough decision: leave his beloved Orkney or wave goodbye to a fledgling career he absolutely adored. His homeland lost that tug of war and Eunson moved his wife and one-year-old son to Aberdeenshire and Glendronach Distillery until that also closed its doors. Glenmorangie became Eunson’s third Highland distillery where he worked as Assistant Manager to Dr Bill Lumsden for two years before Head Office beckoned and he took over as Distillery Manager. After a decade in the role, the chance to reopen a ghosted distillery lured Eunson away. “My wife would argue I don’t have a romantic side to me at all, which is probably true, but when it comes to whisky I do – and the opportunity to re-open the distillery after such a length of closure was too much to resist.” On April Fool’s Day 2008, Eunson stood on the balcony in the Glenglassaugh still house looking at the rusted pipework where sections had been pilfered by thieves and seriously questioned if he’d made the right decision to leave the breathtakingly beautiful, not to mention functioning, Glenmorangie. “But I have to say, the sense of achievement on the day we first mashed in again, after about eight months of struggling to try and design everything to get it to work better… the sense of achievement was fantastic,” he says with real pride all these years later. The next call, to take on a newly created General Manager role at a distillery that was once the largest in Scotland and had fallen out of favour, came in 2011. If he accepted, Eunson would look after everything from the malt coming in, to the distillation, maturation and recipes for all the whiskies. “They sold it well to me,” he says with a wry smile. “Basically, the buck stops for everything with me.” Two years ago, Eunson was asked to choose his new title. After some thought, he suggested General Operations Director – “So GOD,” he laughs; in the end he had to settle for “DOD” – Distillery Operations Director. The beauty of working at Tomatin, according to Eunson, is that he and the 62-strong team are masters of their own destiny. “We have gone from being a distillery which made lots and lots of spirit to go into other peoples’ whiskies. To the complete opposite way round percentage wise,” Eunson says. In the 1970s, Tomatin produced 12.5 million litres of pure alcohol a year making it the largest in Scotland. Today, the Highland distillery produces less than two million litres a year. Of this number, 1.1 million goes into Tomatin in its various forms, roughly 400,000 litres are swapped with other distilleries in exchange for whiskies for their Antiquary, Talisman, Big T, Ancient Clan and other blends, and 100,000 litres is sold for cash. Apart from malting and bottling, every stage of the traditional production – milling, mashing, fermenting, distilling, ageing and blending – takes place on the 140-acre site. “It’s great to be in control of all that ourselves,” Eunson says. “In the last 12 to 15 years, we have had a complete change of tact. We’ve reduced the volumes we’re making and it’s all about quality over quantity.” The gear shift is clearly working. Since its rebrand in 2015, sales have soared by 83% and visitor numbers to the distillery are topping 50,000 a year (in non-pandemic times). Tomatin produces a range of unpeated single malts from the entry-level (£30 a bottle) to the 50-year-old-plus (£10k+ per bottle). In their vast warehouses, the team is sitting on almost 200,000 casks and Eunson oversees it all. “It is one of the few jobs I would have thought in the world that you can do for 30 years and still look forward to going into work,” he says. “My job is wide and varied and never the same two days running.” In his latest project, and the first “serious launch” since the rebrand, Eunson has sourced rare Monbazillac, Sauternes and Rivesaltes barrels to finish three parcels of nine-year-old single malt. In typically self-deprecating fashion, Eunson says: “The stars aligned basically. We had released our Sherry-cask finished Cuatro and were looking at alternatives and these wine casks became available. When the cooperage told me about them, I asked them to hold the casks and got straight on Google.” The cask finishing trend has been one of the biggest changes Eunson has witnessed in his career. He says: “It used to be, ‘Well if it was a tree at some point in its life then you can use it for maturing whisky’, whereas now there is so much more care and attention put into it. “Some of the companies I have worked for… Allied, no longer exist, so I can say what I want about them. They had codes on their stock system for seven-fill and eight-fill casks. By the time you’ve filled it seven or eight times, there’s not a lot of flavour going to come from the wood.” While Eunson says he’d never say the cask is the most important part of the process, he is not shy in professing it is the most influential. “What a lot of companies are doing now, ourselves included, is look at the raw materials – different barley varieties, different types of malt, different yeasts, different lengths of fermentation times, different cut points in the stills – you can play around with all of that but it is still only going to arguably contribute 25 to 35% of the final flavours. Seventy to 75%, even 80%, will come from the time spent in the cask during maturation. “So that is where we have to put the attention to detail because it’s going to have such an impact going forward onto the final character of the whisky we produce.” Computerisation is another huge change in the industry. And not one Eunson thinks is strictly positive. “It’s a good thing in that if you’ve got a computer and sensors running the pumps, setting the temperatures and suchlike, there is less room for human error and you get more consistency of spirit. So you know what your new-make spirit is going to be like but at the same time, that human error can sometimes lead to exceptionally unusual whiskies. You become almost a generic whisky, so we need to be careful to keep the individual characteristics there.” The Tomatin Distillery is semi-automated. It is still up to the Stillmen to decide when to make the cut and how fast to run the stills by controlling the steam valves. Whether it’s technology or trends, Eunson says the one constant in the Scotch whisky industry is change. “We are always changing and trying to be innovative and look at different ways of doing things while still trying to stick to the traditions that have been there and the rules and regulations as well." The industry might constantly be evolving but Eunson says the people within it are far more permanent. “We have a Head Warehouseman who’s been working with us since he was 18 and he’s now 67. He has more or less done the same job in the same distillery for 50 years. He is showing absolutely no intention of retiring and he’s probably the fittest guy we have on site in reality.” And how about Eunson? “I can’t see myself retiring at 60,” he says. “There is way too much that I want to do in the industry to even consider that. I’d probably think about retiring at 65… or maybe 66,” he quickly adds. We’ll believe it when we see it. Browse all Tomatin listings or read more Editorial 

After three decades in the whisky industry Tomatin’s Graham Eunson is more energised than ever. He tells Holly Motion why his latest role is the best yet

Tomatin’s Distillery Operations Director on the pace, and people, that keep him in the industry after more than 30 years working at the coalface.

Tomatin’s Graham Eunson on a life in whisky

Graham Eunson: a life in whisky

Honeysuckle, peach, jasmine. Ripe, perfumed and exotic, viscous and heady – but, at its best, with a mineral, saline line and phenolic grip that keeps its hedonism in check. Condrieu is a wine like no other – and one that couldn’t be much less fashionable if it tried.  And yet, its top bottlings are incredibly hard to find. The likes of Georges Vernay’s Coteau de Vernon or Guigal’s La Doriane fly out on release. Chapoutier’s Coteau de Chery is absorbed effortlessly by France’s finest restaurant wine lists. The iconic Château-Grillet has almost vanished from the world of retail since it was taken over by Artémis. Production might be limited – but it’s also clear that there’s more than enough demand for these very special wines from the Northern Rhône.  The appellation and its unique expression of the Viognier grape has a rocky history. The Romans were the first to cultivate vines in this corner of the Rhône Valley – and they’ve been there ever since. By the 17th century, the wines from the steep slopes around the village of Condrieu were renowned throughout France. In 1853, there were 143 hectares of vines in the region – but then plague and pest arrived: powdery mildew swept through the vines, swiftly followed by phylloxera, decimating vineyards across Europe. With two World Wars, as well as the industrialisation of the valley, the workforce fled the vines for more stable, salaried factory work: looking up at the back-breaking angle of its slopes, entirely unmechanisable, it’s easy to see why the region’s vineyards were almost entirely abandoned. When the Condrieu Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée (AOC) was created in 1940 (encompassing the villages of Condrieu, Vérin and Saint-Michel-sur-Rhône), just six hectares of vines remained.  Only eight of the potential 170 hectares were planted in the 1960s and Condrieu’s future looked uncertain. But one vigneron was quietly working to change that.  Georges Vernay – whose father Francis Vernay had helped create the appellation after planting his family’s first vines on the Coteau de Vernon in 1937 – believed in the alchemy between Condrieu’s biotite granite slopes and the Viognier grape. At the time, the region was best-known for its stone-fruit – with a kilo of peaches worth significantly more than a kilo of grapes. (The area is still known for its fruit today, Jean-Marc Roulot sources the apricots for his eau de vie and liqueur from the Rhône.) When Georges Vernay uprooted orchards to plant Viognier, people called him a fool.  “No one believed in Condrieu anymore, or in Viognier anymore,” Philippe Guigal – the winemaker and third-generation at the helm of his family’s company – tells me. Philippe’s father Marcel was another pioneer of the region, persisting in making fine wine from the region’s uneconomically steep terraces.  Vernay kept his faith too – championing Condrieu, but also Viognier. Almost all the Viognier in the world was planted in Condrieu at the time, and Vernay supplied cuttings to those outside the region – encouraging others to plant this distinctive grape. At the same time, he championed the region with his age-worthy wines, especially the now-iconic Coteau de Vernon.  By 1986 there were still only 19 hectares of Condrieu planted, but Vernay’s battle started paying off – wine-lovers fell for Condrieu’s rich, textural whites and plantings rocketed. There were 38 hectares of vines by 1992 and 217 by 2024. But it wasn’t just in the Rhône that Viognier finally found its footing – plantings appeared in the Ardèche, the Languedoc, Australia, California (especially with the wave of Rhône Rangers, led by Randall Grahm) and beyond. Viognier’s lustre had been restored.  Although now much more widely planted, it’s only in Condrieu that Viognier reaches such heights. Here, on steep terraced slopes in this hallowed corner of the Rhône, the vines sit almost directly on the granite bedrock – a specific type of granite laced with biotite, an iron-rich black mica. It’s this biotite granite that defined the original Condrieu appellation created in 1940 – encompassing vineyards around the villages of Condrieu, Vérin and Saint-Michel-sur-Rhône. The monopole appellation Château-Grillet (sadly unable to comment for this feature) sits within Condrieu, classified four years prior, and sharing the same biotite granite. The iron in the soils is key, lending much-needed tension to the potentially flabby Viognier.  Finding – and keeping – that tension is key to the best Condrieu. And it isn’t about acidity per se, but a sense of freshness.   For Emma Amsellem – who works alongside her mother Christine Vernay at Domaine Georges Vernay, “It’s a combination of different things.” She attributes much to their farming (which is both organic and biodynamic), as well as working with old vines and low yields (normally around 27-30hl/ha). Maxime Chapoutier – who works alongside his larger-than-life father Michel Chapoutier at the eponymous empire – echoes how important vine age is for Viognier, much more so than Syrah or Marsanne, he says. He finds Viognier starts to produce fruit of significantly more complexity at 20-30 years of age, but the vines can also lose interest if they’re too old.   “The beauty of the balance of Viognier comes from its dry extract – from its bitterness,” he explained. It is, Chapoutier says, the hardest grape to pick – harvest too early and you won’t have the necessary dry extract, but harvest too late and the aromatics are too much. Ansellem also emphasised the importance of picking date: although you want to retain as much natural acidity as possible, you also need Viognier to be sufficiently ripe – and the window is getting smaller and smaller with climate change.  The challenge, as Philippe Guigal puts it, is to keep the richness, the full expression of Viognier, as well as its drinkability and salinity. He introduced a Champenois-style cycle, very long and slow, for their Condrieu – something that helps bring out the grape’s aromatics and structure, a concept echoed by both Ansellem and Chapoutier, working with Viognier’s natural thick skins. Chapoutier also highlighted the importance of oxygenising the must and then racking as little as possible, retaining the lees to help build on the grape’s “noble bitterness”.  Guigal is also particularly careful with fermentation temperatures, feeling it is key to keep ferments under 12°C to avoid any potentially heavy aromas.  It's that dry extract that allows top Condrieu to age so beautifully too. Chapoutier explains how he likes to wait at least five years before opening their Coteau de Chery, but it can age for 25, developing more layers of complexity – with notes of honey, lanolin, gingerbread and dried citrus peel. “A great Condrieu is a wine that doesn’t taste of Viognier,” he says.  Tasting through a flight of the region’s top wines last week was fascinating – from Chapoutier’s remarkably fresh, floral Coteau de Chery to the decadent yet mineral Coteau de Vernon from Georges Vernay. More than anything was perhaps seeing the response from those tasting – the wines far surpassing their stereotypical expectations. Not all the haters left lovers, but they certainly had a newfound respect for the style; and those that were already fans fell even harder for its charms.  There’s next to no room for further plantings in Condrieu, largely thanks to Georges Vernay’s efforts championing the region, and quality in the appellation is higher than ever before. The style of its heady wines will always be divisive – and perhaps that’s a good thing given how limited production of the best wines is. Its cool credentials may not quite have caught up yet, but it’s time to open up to the region’s opulent embrace – you won’t regret it.  Top Condrieu cuvées to look out for  Chapoutier’s Coteau de Chery: From a single parcel of vines between 40 and 80 years in age, this is aged entirely in old oak (larger, 600-litre casks). Production is tiny (often only two barrels) and goes almost exclusively to restaurants in France.  Georges Vernay’s Coteau de Vernon: This is just a stone’s throw (100m or so) from Vernay’s other single-vineyard, Les Chaillés de l’Enfer (literally meaning the terraces of hell, for its steep south-facing slopes). From the region’s most famous pioneer, the vines were planted in the 1930s and 1960s, in a natural amphitheatre, producing a profound expression of Viognier that ages beautifully.  Guigal’s La Doriane: Guigal’s top Condrieu is a blend of their top five parcels across the appellation, averaging 35 years in age, matured in 100% new oak – which is seamlessly integrated with the concentrated and powerful fruit.  Château-Grillet: The tiny monopole appellation covers 3.5 hectares of vines. Owned by the Artémis group (owners of Ch. Latour) since 2011, its wines are some of the most sought-after in the world, largely disappearing into wine lists.  Yves Gangloff’s Condrieu: Renowned for its voluptuous style, in all the best ways, this bottling from this famous winemaker is rightfully prized.  André Perret’s Chéry: Known also for their Clos Chanson cuvée, Chéry also comes from the Coteau de Chery, from a three-hectare plot of 70-year-old vines.  Ogier’s Les Vieilles Vignes de Jacques Vernay: Only 125 cases are made of this wine per year, making it incredibly hard to find.  Marie & Pierre Benetière’s Condrieu: Possibly even harder to find than their astounding Côte-Rôties, Pierre was inspired by and studied under Vernay before making his own wines.   Explore all current listings of Condrieu or read more Editorial 

The epitome of Viognier, Condrieu makes some of the world’s most remarkable wines – yet this appellation in the Northern Rhône came close to disappearing. Sophie Thorpe dives into its brush with fate and how producers manage Viognier’s natural hedonism to create wines that stand the test of time 

Condrieu’s wines are better than ever. We talk to Georges Vernay, Guigal and Chapoutier about the appellation’s comeback 

Condrieu’s comeback with Vernay, Guigal and Chapoutier 

Condrieu’s comeback 

The latest from Latour In the wake of last week’s launch of the 2016 vintage of the First Growth’s third wine, Pauillac de Latour, the Pauillac powerhouse will be releasing the 2013 vintage of the Grand Vin, as well as 2015 Les Forts de Latour, its second wine. The 2013 is only the second vintage of the Grand Vin that the property has released since it moved away from en primeur – and there’s no doubt, despite the vintage’s sometimes maligned reputation, that this is going to be highly sought-after. New from Champagne March brings with it a bounty of fine fizz releases. Top of our wish-list are the new wines from Henri Giraud – a House that produces small volumes of outstanding, terroir-driven wines, almost all of which are oak-fermented (and is, for that reason, often compared favourably to Krug). We’ll see the latest release of its multi-vintage cuvée (described by Jancis Robinson MW as “a sort of Montrachet of Champagne”) and the new, 2013 vintage of their top wine, Argonne. Keep an eye out also for 2007 Bollinger R.D. and Pol Roger’s 2012 Sir Winston Churchill.  Single-farm spirits The unfailingly modish and exciting Irish distillery Waterford has been making waves in recent weeks, having scientifically proven terroir’s influence in whisky. This month will see the latest spirits from the Irish distillery released – two single-farm single malts that offer a chance for you to explore the concept yourself. One comes from Hook Head – a site on the southern coast with clay-loam soils, while the other hails from Lakefield, with deep loam soils in County Laois. Burgundy There are still a few 2019s emerging from the Côte d’Or – including wines from Domaine des Lambrays and Le Grappin. Clos des Lambrays was a stand-out from our trip in October last year, while Aussie Andrew Nielsen’s Le Grappin wines (a darling of London’s restaurant scene) offer brilliant value year in, year out. The 2021 collection from Maison Leroy has almost entirely sold out, however we’ll also see the latest releases from the rest of Lalou Bize-Leroy’s empire – Domaine Leroy and Domaine d’Auvenay. Available, as ever, in tiny volumes, these are some of the world’s most collectable wines, and unmissable for Burgundy aficionados. Italian icons After a series of superlative 2016s from Brunello, Tuscany is on the mind. While Castello di Ama’s 2017 San Lorenzo is already available, the 2018 vintage of the Chianti Classico property’s flagship wine, L’Apparita, will be released in the coming weeks. Tasting through a selection of the range with our team, CEO Lorenza Sebasti told us that she and winemaker Marco Pallanti feel it’s “the best we’ve ever made”. We’ll also see the new vintage of Ornellaia’s entry-level bottling – Le Volte dell’Ornellaia, which provides an affordable and earlier-drinking taste of this Super Tuscan estate, ahead of the release of Ornellaia “proper” in April.

A new month brings another flurry of fine wine and spirits releases. While Bordeaux en primeur is on the horizon, March sees new vintages from Latour and the Grandes Marques, as well as releases from Tuscany, Burgundy and Ireland’s most exciting distillery: here’s our pick of the bunch

A new month brings another flurry of fine wine and spirits releases. Here, we pick the best of the bunch – from Latour, Castello di Ama, Waterford and more 

The wines and spirits to look out for this March

What to look out for this March

What is Cristal – and who makes it? 
The Grande Marque Champagne Louis Roederer produces Cristal. Founded in 1833, Roederer is the largest independent, family-owned Champagne house today. Cristal is their prestige cuvée – the very best wine they produce, only made in the finest years. Always a vintage wine, it's a blend of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. The current Chef de Cave (and Executive Vice-President) at the house is Jean-Baptiste Lécaillon, who is responsible for the entire Louis Roederer range. When was Cristal first made? The wine is considered the first and original “prestige cuvée”. It was first made for Tsar Alexander II in 1876, after he asked Louis Roederer to reserve the house’s best wine for him and his court. At the time, Roederer was one of the few house’s to own its own vineyards (a legacy that continues today). A gold capsule and label was used to indicate that the wine was the best in the range, as was common at the time. Reportedly, the Tsar lived in fear of assassination – and as such requested that the wine be bottled in clear glass, so that he could see if it had been poisoned, and with a flat bottom so that bombs couldn’t be contained in the punt (the traditional indent in the base of Champagne bottles). The glass used was lead-crystal – giving the wine its name, “Cristal”. When the Russian Revolution took place in 1917 and the Tsars were no more, Roederer continued to make the wine – releasing it commercially for the first time in 1945. Although the wine would originally have been sweet, the dry style of Champagne gradually became more popular (made initially for the English market) and Cristal evolved with the fashion. Today it is one of the most sought-after Champagnes in the world, alongside other prestige cuvées such as Taittinger’s Comtes de Champagne, Dom Pérignon, Krug, Pol Roger’s Sir Winston Churchill, Veuve Clicquot’s La Grande Dame and Bollinger’s Grande Année. How is Cristal made? Until 1999, Cristal was blended solely on taste. Different parcels from Roederer’s estate vineyards were tasted blind and the best-possible wine created. From 1999 onwards, however, Jean-Baptiste Lécaillon took over and started using the same 45 plots, all mid-slope with chalky soils across seven different Grands Crus. These plots have all been farmed biodynamically since 2012. Only fruit from vines more than 20 years old is used for the prestige cuvée, with any younger-vine fruit declassified to the Collection bottlings (the estate’s vintage, Blanc de Blancs and rosé wines all come from specific vineyards). Typically, it’s a blend of around 40% Chardonnay and 60% Pinot Noir. The base wines are mainly fermented in stainless steel, with a proportion in oak. The wine undergoes secondary fermentation and is aged on lees for a minimum six years, then aged for at least eight months after disgorgement prior to release. With climate change and general trends in Champagne, the dosage has been reduced – from 12-13 to around 8g/l today. The final blend is still blind-tasted by the family to ensure the wine is up to scratch. Around 300,000 to 400,000 bottles of Cristal are made a year. 
What does Cristal taste like? Cristal is an incredible Champagne – and one of the most age-worthy. With vibrant acidity and refined minerality, it is a linear and precise style of Champagne that rewards time in bottle. Complex, expressive and aromatic, critics have awarded the wine multiple 100-point scores over the years – notably the 2002 and 2008 vintages. To further emphasise its ageability, in 2017 Louis Roederer released the first of a new series of Vinothèque bottlings – aged both longer on lees and then for a further 10 years on cork. The first Vinothèque wines were from the 1995 vintage, but wines from 1996, 1997, 1999 and 2000 have since also been released. These are available in extremely limited volumes, but offer a taste of the wines with maturity. They tend to have a slightly lower dosage than the earlier-released wines. Is Cristal rosé? Yes and no. The original prestige cuvée is a white wine, however a rosé sibling was introduced with the 1974 vintage, created by Jean-Claude Rouzaud. The wine celebrates old-vine Pinot Noir from Grand Cru vineyards in Aÿ, historically from three sites (Bonotte Pierre Robert, Gargeotte and Côte du Moulin), but now also from La Villers. Pinot Noir typically represents 55% of the blend, complemented with Chardonnay from Pierre Vaudon in Avize and Montmartin in Le Mesnil. Cristal Rosé is made using the saignée method – pressing the grapes to extract colour, with the Pinot and Chardonnay then co-fermented (rather than blending). From the 2008 vintage, the Pinot Noir sees a cold-soak "infusion" with no punching over/pumping down, for up to 10 days. Around 20% of the base wine is aged in oak. The wine goes through secondary fermentation in bottle and is aged on lees for around eight years prior to release. Why is Cristal wrapped in plastic? The trademark gold cellophane wrapper is to protect the wine from UV light. As the wine is bottled in clear glass, UV light can cause “light strike” – a fault that causes cabbage or rotten-egg aromas in the wine. As such, the plastic should be kept on the wine until it is served. Cristal’s street cred and controversy Cristal was once the choice of hip-hop’s most famous names. “Cristal forever/Play the crib when it’s mink weather,” raps the Notorious B.I.G. on Jay-Z’s Brooklyn’s Finest. Raekwon, 50 Cent, Big L and many more were all fans. Tupac even created a cocktail with Cristal called “Thug Passion”, a combination of Cristal and Alizé Gold Passion liqueur. In 2006, however, Frédéric Rouzaud – seventh-generation of the Roederer family and CEO – was asked in an interview about the wine’s association with a “bling” lifestyle. In response he said, “What can we do? We can’t forbid people from buying it. I’m sure Dom Pérignon or Krug would be delighted to have their business.” Jay-Z responded: “It has come to my attention that the managing director of Cristal, Frédéric Rouzaud, views the ‘hip-hop’ culture as ‘unwelcome attention’. I view his comments as racist and will no longer support any of his products through any of my various brands, including the 40/40 Club, nor in my personal life.” Others followed, and soon Cristal was replaced by other wines and spirits. Jay-Z’s own brand of Champagne, Armand de Brignac, was launched later that year – thought partly to be a retaliation. Browse all Cristal listings or read more Editorial 


Cristal is one of the world’s most sought-after wines – but how did Champagne Louis Roederer’s prestige cuvée come to be, and what makes it so special? Here’s everything you need to know about the wine

Everything you need to know about Cristal – Champagne Louis Roederer’s cult prestige cuvée, from its Russian beginnings to hip-hop credibility

Your ultimate guide to Cristal Champagne

Everything you need to know about Cristal Champagne

To Kalon. For any Californian winemaker, those two words represent the Holy Grail. This vineyard in Oakville, Napa, is undeniably the region’s most famous. Perched at the foot of the Mayacamas, west of Highway 29, this site has been recognised for producing fine wine since the 19th century. Literally translating as the “highest beauty” or “highest good” from Greek, today To Kalon is home to some of Napa’s oldest vines and best Cabernet Sauvignon. “This is a Grand Cru – a premier property,” Paul Hobbs tells me, a winemaker who has a long history with the site. As a grad student at UC Davis, Hobbs would swipe the second crop from a vineyard on Walnut Drive – what happened to be BV4, Beaulieu Vineyard’s original block of To Kalon. At Mondavi – the largest holder of the hallowed site – he got to walk the rows more legitimately, and used those holdings to build Opus One – the company’s joint venture with Ch. Mouton Rothschild (although the association with the site has generally been played down). Under his own label, he’s been making wine from the Beckstoffer section of the vineyard since 1999 – and his wines, along with those from Schrader, were some of the early bottlings that put the vineyard firmly on the fine wine map, earning high scores – and lots of attention. Indeed, it was a Paul Hobbs wine that made Tor Kenward believe the vineyard was truly special. André Tchelistcheff had spoken to Kenward about BV4, but it was one of Hobbs’s bottlings that made him realise its potential. He started working with Beckstoffer plots from 2005. 
“It’s not visually impressive; it doesn’t have that ‘wow factor’,” Kenward tells me. But start digging below the surface, and you realise that you’re in the “tenderloin of Napa”, with old creek beds that run through the site. It’s an alluvial fan that runs down from the Mayacamas, sitting almost on a bench – with very little elevation. But the soils here are varied, with deep, well-drained gravels that make it perfect for Cabernet Sauvignon.  Andy Erickson – a winemaker whose resume includes Screaming Eagle, Harlan, Dalla Valle, Mayacamas and many more – first worked with the site in 2012, on a single-barrel charity lot for an auction at his children’s school. When Constellation (owners of Mondavi and co-owners of Opus One) called him to give him the chance to work with it again in 2016, he didn’t hesitate. That year, he made the first wine for the To Kalon Vineyard Company – a project that is a revival of the brand created by H.W. Crabb (known variously as Henry Walker, Hiram Walker or Hamilton Walker Crabb) in 1886, the vineyard’s godfather. “Most people know the recent history of the vineyard, and the acclaim of the wines from the past 15-20 years. But the vineyard was known for producing remarkable wines all the way back in the late 19th century. Clearly there is something there,” Erickson says.  But this vineyard is weighed down with controversy – its borders endlessly debated, with producers vying for use of the To Kalon name.  The history of the To Kalon Vineyard It’s impossible to look at To Kalon today without tracing its origins. H.W. Crabb came west from Ohio during the Gold Rush, spending six months digging in the Sierras before settling in Oakville in 1868, buying 240 acres of land at the corner of Highway 29 and Walnut Drive. He planted a wide range of crops, first making wine in 1872 under the name Hermosa Vineyards (“hermosa” meaning “beautiful” in Spanish). In 1881, he acquired another 119 acres from Eliza Yount (whose name lives on in Yountville). On land to the west of his plots, owned by John Davis, he planted additional vines – buying the fruit off Davis to feed his increasing production. In 1886, he gave his company a new name: “To Kalon Vineyard Company” – and the legend was born. Crabb reportedly said, “The name To-Kalon… means the highest beauty, or the highest good, but I try to make it mean the boss vineyard.”
 To Kalon Vineyard Company rapidly became one of the region’s largest – and most well-respected – wine producers. His wines started winning awards at competitions around the world, and he was the first to start selling wine along the East Coast. He had planted a huge range of grapes – around 400 different varieties, including Malvasia, Riesling, Chasselas, Muscat, Refosco and Cabernet Sauvignon, with the latter in particular thriving. In 1889, he bought 168 acres on the hillside to the south, close to where Harlan is now based, although it was never planted with vines during Crabb’s lifetime. In 1891, Crabb bought Davis’s 135 acres (from which he’d already been buying the fruit). In total, Crabb had more than 359 acres.  But his success wasn’t to last – phylloxera arrived in the late 19th century, and recession along with it. In 1898, Crabb sold the 135 acres he’d bought just eight years earlier – and died one year later in 1899. The vines were ripped out, replaced by cherry trees under David Perry Doak in 1911, who in turn purchased another 500 acres of vines from John Benson, south of the border of the original To Kalon (across Oakville Grade Road), which is now all owned by Constellation (used for Mondavi or Opus One). After Crabb’s death, what remained of the To Kalon Vineyard Company was sold to ES Churchill at auction, taken over by his widow Mary Churchill when he died in 1903. Wines continued to be sold under the label until the arrival of Prohibition in 1920. The winery reopened briefly to sell wine in bulk in the 1930s, but the winery building burnt down in 1939. Four years later, Martin Stelling bought most of the property – 337 acres – and replanted. He sold 90 acres to Beaulieu Vineyard (the block that became known as BV4 – and was the plot used by André Tschelistcheff made Georges de Latour Reserve). In 1944, Stelling bought an additional 1,700 acres – the McGill Ranch, which included the parcels owned by Doak (both Crabb’s 1891 parcel and the 500 acres area south of Oakville Grade Road). He named the entire property Tokalon Vineyards, and in 1945 planted Sauvignon Blanc in I Block – the legendary parcel that is today used for Mondavi’s prized, old-vine To Kalon Fumé Blanc.  Tragedy struck again, however, with Stelling killed in a car crash in 1950. The property was once more divided, sold off in pieces by his widow.   
Rosa Mondavi, along with her sons Robert and Peter, purchased 132 hectares in 1962 for the family winery, Charles Krug. After Robert struck out on his own, he bought 12 acres for himself in 1966 (that remained in the Stelling family) – in the northeast corner of the 1968 Crabb parcel, where the Mondavi winery and visitor centre remains today. He bought a further 230 acres in 1968, and then took the Charles Krug section from the rest of his family in 1978. The first time the To Kalon name appeared on a Mondavi label – and the first time since the demise of the To Kalon Vineyard Company – was on the 1986 Fumé Blanc Reserve. The I Block – the Sauvignon Blanc vines planted by Stelling in 1945 – were singled out for the first time in 1995, for the vines’ 50th anniversary. The first red – Mondavi’s To Kalon Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon – appeared with the 1997 vintage. The To Kalon Vineyard’s terroir As already mentioned, To Kalon is largely an alluvial fan that stretches down from the Mayacamas to Highway 29. It is, however, a large piece of land (the exact area depending on where you draw its borders – see below for more on the controversy around this) – and as such the terroir varies considerably. The soils are richer downslope, closer to the Highway; poorer and better-drained higher up (where many – including Hobbs and Kenward – prefer to be). The gravel composition varies with the subtle slope differences and underground water.  “It’s like any cut of meat – there are better parts than others,” Hobbs says. With over 300 original acres (at least), this is a substantial vineyard (for comparison, Clos Vougeot is 125 acres). “It’s great if you have the name To Kalon, but could be pretty average stuff.” The Beckstoffer section is numbered and lettered: A to F, from road to mountain, with A1 south of A2. For Hobbs, he likes the blocks closer to the mountains, and those that aren’t shaded by the huge walnut trees that line Walnut Drive (to the south). Hobbs noted how much warmer Oakville is than Yountville – something he used to notice when driving in the evening home from Oakville to Yountville. The mountains block the sea breezes, meaning that the cooling effect happens, but more slowly. This is partly what makes it such a special place. Tor Kenward similarly prefers some of the middle blocks in B and C, where there are some of the vineyard’s oldest vines, but with lower vigour, as well as the leaner soils closest to the mountains. As for the MacDonald or Horton block: “You could argue it’s every bit as good as Andy’s piece,” Kenward says. It, along with the Detert block, was planted in the 1940s – and in fact those two blocks are now home to some of the valley’s oldest vines. Even closer to the mountains, the gravel content is even higher, and the fruit is picked up to a month earlier than elsewhere in To Kalon. Although until now most of that fruit has been sold to Constellation, there will be opportunity for others to work with it as that contract comes to an end.   
The Beckstoffer plots of To Kalon Andy Beckstoffer bought Beaulieu Vineyard’s block, BV4, in 1993. He’d just lost a prized site – Liparita, on Howell Mountain – when the 89 acres of BV4 came up. He’d worked the site for years and leapt at the opportunity to buy it. “It’s a mystery to me why they sold it,” Paul Hobbs told me, although word on the grapevine was that they needed to liquidate funds – indeed, it was around the same time that Mondavi went public for similar reasons. Phylloxera was once more raging through the region thanks to the widely used, non-resistant AXR rootstock.  The BV4 block was in bad shape when Beckstoffer took it over and he had to replant the entire site. Paul Hobbs was one of the first to use fruit from Beckstoffer’s plots, starting to work with him from 1995/96. “Andy didn’t really realise he had a Grand Cru property,” Hobbs says. Hobbs was given free rein to pick his plots, opting for four or five plots on the western side, furthest from Highway 29. The vineyard produced its first fruit in 1997; 1998 was a difficult year; but in 1999 Hobbs was able to produce his first To Kalon bottling (although it couldn’t say so on the label). “I was loathe to tell people how young it was – but the quality was so good,” Hobbs says, still starry eyed thinking about it. “It was only four years old, but producing stunning wines.” Most fruit is sold on its weight, by the ton, but Andy Beckstoffer created a different model – one that is intricately tied to the vineyard’s name and reputation – and arguably has increased its reputation. Producers who use his fruit pay him 175 times the bottle price per ton, with a ceiling at $50,000/ton; tying the value of the fruit to the value of the final wine. “For producers like me in those days, when I didn’t have the land or ability to buy land, Andy was a saviour of sorts,” Hobbs tells me. “Because I had access to one of the top vineyards in all of Napa. I had to pay – but at least I had access.”
  The To Kalon controversy: how big is it? And is it a brand or a place? Mondavi trademarked the name “To Kalon” in 1988, and “To Kalon Vineyard” in 1994. This gave them the right to use the name on any wine from anywhere – even beyond California – and meant that no one else could use the name, even if they had plots in what was considered the original To Kalon vineyard. The first Beckstoffer bottlings only mentioned the name on the back label; but in 2000, Schrader decided to put it on the front label. The now famous lawsuit commenced. “They shouldn’t have been able to trademark it,” Hobbs tells me. “Anyone from the original To Kalon estate should have the right to the trademark as well.” In 2002, Mondavi sued Schrader for using the name on their Beckstoffer bottling. Countersuing ensued, from both Schrader and Beckstoffer (the latter arguing that Mondavi was misleading clients by using the name for wines made with fruit from beyond the vineyard’s original borders). A settlement – the details of which remain a mystery – was made in 2003, but wines made from the Beckstoffer section can now bear the name “Beckstoffer To Kalon”.  Constellation bought Mondavi in 2004, and then Schrader in 2017. Reportedly attempts were made to trademark “To Kalon Wine Company”, “To Kalon Vineyard Company” and “Rooted in To Kalon” – something, unsurprisingly, that Beckstoffer objected to. The legal battle continues today, with a fight over the naming of To Kalon Creek, and The Vineyard House – owned by Jeremy Nickel, which sits on the 1889 hillside section – arguing for the use of the name as well.  The borders of the vineyard are a constant source of debate – and given the history above, you can see why.  Andy Beckstoffer considers the original To Kalon to be only the parcels bought by Crabb in 1868 and 1881. The 1889 parcel was never planted by Crabb, so most aren’t inclined to include it as “original To Kalon”. The Detert and MacDonald plots, however, aren’t acknowledged by Beckstoffer, but were planted – and, albeit more briefly than other plots, owned by Crabb. Then there’s the “Stelling extension”, the southern section added after Crabb’s death under Martin Stelling, that Mondavi considers part of the original vineyard, but some others do not. Given the sums fruit – and wine – bearing the To Kalon name command, it’s unsurprising that its usage is so disputed.  
To Kalon: what does the wine taste like?  So what makes the wine so special? Why do winemakers fight for the fruit, and consumers for the bottles they produce? Despite the sheer variety of the site, Tor Kenward is adamant that there’s a continuity, with a profile that that site gives Cabernet. He describes it as “wall-to-wall carpeting”, a plushness to the mid-palate, a softness, that means the Cabernet isn’t hard-edged. “There’s something about the ground there,” Andy Erickson agrees. For him, To Kalon has a distinct tannin texture – not as rugged as hillside sites, but richer, with a generosity in the wines. “They are dark, aromatic, but very broad and polished,” he says. “I think the vineyard brings forward many of the complexities of Cabernet Sauvignon, but delivers it in a very approachable and elegant package.” “It’s very identifiable,” Paul Hobbs says. “It’s a structural and textural thing mostly. It’s a freshness to this sort of tannin. It has grip, but it has this uplifting character.” He explains it like a skipping stone – you think you’ve got it, then another wave comes, the wine shifting on the palate. For him, one of the most distinctive things is that Cabernet sings alone here – much better than blended with other varietals. “It didn’t need the help of its brothers,” he says. “It’s a wine that’s at peace with itself… It doesn’t shock you, except in its beauty.”
 Who owns what today in To Kalon? Robert Mondavi: From the original 12 acres, Mondavi now owns 328 acres of To Kalon, including the Stelling extension. Has the rights to use the To Kalon name.  Opus One: The 35-acre Q Block was sold to the joint venture by Mondavi in 1981, with K block acquired in 2008. Although under Constellation’s ownership they could likely use the To Kalon name, Opus One doesn’t trade on this. (To Kalon Vineyard Company uses fruit from Constellation’s holdings, both Opus One and Mondavi plots.) UC Davis: a research block that was key in developing phylloxera-resistant rootstock
Beckstoffer: 89 acres, with fruit sold to a range of producers (currently 23), including Paul Hobbs, Tor Kenward and Schrader. Producers can use the name “Beckstoffer To Kalon” on their labels. MacDonald (sometimes referenced as Horton): Graeme and Alex MacDonald are the current generation, owning 21 acres of the 1891 parcel. When their great-grandparents bought the site in 1954 (along with the Detert plot – see below – from Caroline Stelling, Martin Stelling’s widow) it was planted with cherry trees. Advised by Robert Mondavi, the MacDonalds planted vines. From 1966, they sold grapes to Mondavi – holding some back for personal use from 2004, with the first MacDonald commercial release in 2010 (just 92 cases). Although historically 75% of production here has been sold to Mondavi, I’m led to believe that the contract is coming to a close and won’t be renewed. The MacDonalds can’t use the To Kalon name on their wines currently. Detert: Today owned by Tom Garrett, a cousin of the MacDonalds. This 25-acre plot was bought in 1954, along with the MacDonald parcel – divided between the buyers’ children giving the two plots today. There’s more Cabernet Franc in this section. Most of the fruit is sold to Mondavi (with the contract, as for MacDonald, coming to an end soon), and Detert can’t use the To Kalon name on their wines. The Vineyard House: Many dispute whether or not this is original To Kalon; it’s on the hillside area purchased (but not planted) by Crabb in 1891. This plot is owned by Jeremy Justin Nickel, who is the son of the late Far Niente proprietor Gil Nickel. It’s thought to have first been planted with vines in 1980. They can’t use the To Kalon name on their wines, but have taken court action over the issue.  Wineries with To Kalon bottlings  NB Not all of these will bear the To Kalon name on the label Mondavi Winery, Opus One, To Kalon Vineyard Company, MacDonald, Detert, Alpha Omega, Amici, Alejandro Bulgheroni Estate, AXR, Bacio Divino, B Cellars, Boich Family, Bounty Hunter, Cain Concept, Carter cellars, Ch Boswell, Jacquelynn, Kitchak, Cliff Lede, Morlet, Realm Cellars, Tor Kenward, Paul Hobbs, Schrader Cellars Read more Editorial 

The Napa Valley has many incredible vineyards, but To Kalon undoubtedly sits at the top of the tree. As the To Kalon Vineyard Company releases their latest vintage, Sophie Thorpe delves into the story of this iconic site – from its 19th century origins to the fight to use its hallowed name

Explore the history of To Kalon vineyard – and what makes it such an iconic site today. We spoke to Andy Erickson, Paul Hobbs and Tor Kenward to find out more

The tale of Napa’s iconic To Kalon vineyard

The tale of To Kalon

It is hard to write the history of the future, but I hope that I am on safe ground when I say that the global pandemic of 2020 will be the defining event of the early 21st century. I say ‘hope’ because God help the human race if there is anything more defining waiting around the corner. By saying as much, I do not in any way diminish the other spectres that have haunted the dawning decades of the third millennium: among them mankind’s age-old companions, intolerance, religious fundamentalism and greed. Nevertheless, the pandemic has humbled humanity in a new and special way, combining our oldest foe, disease, with swift, easy, international travel – until recently one of the most central aspects of our technical and cultural advancement. Death and destruction, like everything else in life, are neither evenly nor democratically apportioned. Nevertheless, there can be few, if any, people on the planet whose lives have been untouched. Maybe there is a tribe of rainforest-dwelling Pygmies, cut off from what we hubristically call civilisation and which continues to exist in a state of prelapsarian Stone-Age ignorance. But the rest of us have been simultaneously confronted by our mortality, the fragility of our lives and, in many cases, the vacuity of our dreams. We reacted in different ways, retreating into what we found comforting. Some (yes, you, David Geffen) used social media to let the world know that they were safe on their yachts. Others explored the restorative powers of one of the most fundamental and symbolically domestic of rituals: baking bread. My own reaction was somewhere between these two poles. Within just a few days of the pandemic being declared in the UK, I had taken to the virtual airwaves with films – exquisitely directed by my younger son – of me smoking cigars with my elder son and dilating on the joys of the fragrant blue smoke of Havana cigars. Trivial perhaps, superfluous almost definitely, but to me immensely significant. It is hard to express the emotional impact of this activity without resorting to cliché, but then clichés tend to be clichés because there is an element of truth in them. And while the term ‘intergenerational male bonding’ is an arid form of words that traduces the emotional value of the experience, it also begins to explain its worth. But more than just finding a new way of communicating with my children, I like to feel that I am passing on something from which they can derive satisfaction; I was first inculcated into the world of the cigar by my stepfather-in-law – who splendidly encapsulated the appeal as being “the feeling of well-being” derived from learning how to wield this refined instrument of pleasure. Pleasure and well-being are the inspirations of these broadcasts (as I rather self-consciously, antediluvially, call them), and to my surprise they established a moderate but relatively enthusiastic following. Given that I am old enough to have children in their 20s, I am also old enough to regard the idea of using a telephone to make a home movie that has no actual physical presence, and that can be viewed via another intangible medium, as being pretty close to witchcraft. I find it remarkable that as many as 15,000 people – most of whom I have never met, living I know not where – tuned in to watch two men in slightly extravagant clothes (we wore safari suits, cowboy outfits, boating blazers, dinner jackets, business suits and tweeds) set fire to tubes of tobacco and try and convey a sense of the flavours they were tasting. But more than a degustatory sensation to be relayed, it was, in its way, an act of cultural transmission that in its essence is not very different to the role of say, indigent troubadours that wandered the courts of 12th and 13th century Provence, or the griots of the Mali empire of the 14th century, telling stories of noble exploits of the past. As we sat amongst its fragrant swirling wisps and gossamer tendrils; the sacred smoke of the cigar would unlock the past and liberate fragments of memory from wherever it is that memories are imprisoned and presumed forgotten. As we shared the flavour and the experience, recollections of my visits to Havana over the last quarter-century would be summoned unbidden – oxymoronic though that may sound. I remembered names of rollers, long conversations with factory directors and days spent in the fields of the plantations. I recalled meeting an ancient torcedor who had started work as a child and he remembered rolling cigars for Winston Churchill. I was reminded of a long afternoon spent on the terrace of the simple home of the late Alejandro Robaina, the Cuban tobacco farmer, whose time-furrowed face would give the pachydermic features of W.H. Auden stiff competition. He sat in his rocking chair and retrieved his own memories of how the climate had changed over the course of a generation, and of the taste of his first cigar, enjoyed before the age of 10 during the 1920s. However imperfectly, I was able to transmit these memories to my children in a setting and an atmosphere that made those memories theirs too. It is the associative power of the cigar to stimulate memory that raises it beyond the mere intake of nicotine, and instead elevates it to the level of a cultural activity. Proust had his madeleine and I have my cigar. I pick the cigar because it has been a personal comfort during a difficult time, but the same can be said to be true of any skill-laden and ritual-rich activity that is passed from generation to generation. I enjoy traditionally made clothes and I find the idea appealing that many hands contribute to the making of a single garment. It may be better-made than its ready-to-wear counterpart, it is likely to last longer and fit better – but these are only the tangible aspects. At the risk of sounding pretentious, there is what one might call a spiritual element to having clothes made. There is something uniquely appealing about clothes that have been made only for you and it is an appeal to which I succumbed almost 40 years ago. I first got into having clothes made for me long before I could afford it, when, as an undergraduate at Oxford, I fell under the spell of a charming old tailor called Stamp, Mr Stamp to his friends. He was a fabulous old boy with a shop on Broad Street, or The Broad as I believe we were encouraged to call it at the time, just down from Castell where he had started as an apprentice half a century earlier during the 1930s. He made me a pair of trousers, a blazer and few other items including several remarkable waistcoats. One of the best moments came when I took in a 50-year-old, double-breasted waistcoat for him to copy. He looked at it, examined a label sewn into the underside of the backstrap, peered at the stitching around the buttonholes, and then told me that the garment had been made for a well-known Spitfire test pilot, gave me the price of the fabric per yard in 1936 and – most impressive of all – informed me of the name of the man who had stitched the buttonholes.  My first shoemaker Eric Cook also beguiled me when he took a look at a pair of Lobb correspondent shoes, turned them over and was able to identify the man who had finished them because of the slightly elliptical curvature of the heel and the spacing of the nails.  For me, such knowledge is just as impressive as that of the connoisseur who can identify a long-lost masterpiece by examining the brushstrokes and the state of the canvas or wooden panel on which the paint was laid. But, unlike the admiration of an acknowledged masterpiece by a globally renowned artistic genius, the quality of such pleasures is more personal and, arguably, more meaningful. It was Franz Liszt who said, “A good Cuban cigar closes the door to the vulgarities of life,” but the same is true of the contemplation of a well-sewn buttonhole, or the anglage of a well-finished watch movement. Such pleasures may be only fleetingly experienced, but I would argue they are all the more precious for their intimacy: watches and clothes are worn on the body, the cigar is consumed – becoming in some way part of the body and stimulating the mind. These are things that ornament life, that raise the quotidian to the memorable and that transcend the disagreeable nature of too much of life today. I suppose that this is what is meant by ‘luxury’. I had been hoping to get to Paris to catch an exhibition, at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, devoted to the controversial subject of luxury, mounted under the aegis of my friend Pierre-Alexis Dumas, creative director of Hermès, who understands the field better than most. “While the luxury object resists definition by any single concept, drawing instead on shifting, eclectic visions, we might nonetheless agree that it possesses one distinctive characteristic above all others,” he told me. It is, he believes, “an object we keep, respect and cherish, one that archaeological discoveries across the globe reveal as speaking timelessly to us, its human power undimmed, resonant with distant emotions. Today, at a time when luxury seems to hold omnipresent status, in the media and in social networks, it is perhaps pertinent to recall that the luxury object is precisely one that is preserved and passed on – a magnificent, enduring conduit of culture and knowledge, bearing witness to human ingenuity.” The overuse of the word ‘luxury’ has led to its trivialisation, but there is a sense in which the pandemic has helped me transmit to my children something of my view of its true meaning. In a world of ever abbreviated communication, the chance to spend time in contemplation of what I love with those I love has been a gift – and the suspension of the ceaseless restless turmoil that we regard as normality, has shorn many so-called luxury items of their status-conferring function, allowing us to see them for what they are, to winnow the impostor from the authentic. I hope that I have conveyed, however clumsily, what it is that I appreciate, and uncovered something of the culture and values that make them important to me. My sons are fascinating people, their company is genuinely instructive for me, I see things anew through their eyes and this in turn has added further richness to life’s pleasures: not just appreciating the intrinsic qualities of, say a cigar or a suit, but in enhancing that appreciation by seeing it reflected in my children. It is a powerful combination of culture, emotion and enjoyment. Whether a vessel of personal memory, a conduit for the great values of humanity, or a bulwark against the deadening combination of fear and tedium of recent months: the superfluous, to misquote Voltaire ever so slightly, has seldom been so necessary. This article was originally published in FONDATA, Issue One

Writer and author Nicholas Foulkes considers the notion of transmitting cultural knowledge and enthusiasms from one generation to the next – and how finding joy in the seemingly trivial details of the objects he values has brought him closer to his sons. 

Photography by Julian Broad.

Nicholas Foulkes considers the notion of transmitting cultural knowledge and enthusiasms from one generation to the next.

FONDATA: Foulkes & Sons 

Foulkes & Sons  

Churchill Graham

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This is the price you paid for this item.

Cost price

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The lowest price you're willing to sell at. If the net price goes below this value your listing will be removed.

shows all the items that you have pre-ordered, including en primeur wines, and all the items on your watchlist.

Futures

You can set a floor price on items you're selling based on a % of current unit net value.

You can set a market price on items you're selling based on a % of current unit net value.

shows all the actions that you have taken on items in your Portfolio.

groups every action by type - Purchase, Sale, Delivery, and Inbound Transfer - so it's clear at a glance what happened to each item.

History

shows all the items that are currently in transit to or from {shortName}.

In transit

Local delivery is free for orders over HK$1,800 (to a single location). For orders below this value, delivery is HK$150 for up to four cases and HK$50 per case thereafter.

Shipping starts from €15 within Italy and €45 to Switzerland and the rest of Europe for up to 48 bottles (75cl). Costs vary by destination. Larger shipments can be quoted on request.

The date shown below is when your order will ship from our local warehouse. Your final delivery date, along with full tracking details, will be provided once our team has processed your request.

You can arrange collection from our Retail store on 22nd Floor, 8 Wyndham Street, Central Hong Kong.
Collection times are between 9:30am-13:00 and 14:00-18:00pm, Monday to Friday. We are closed on public holidays.

You can arranged collection from our warehouse STI INTERNAZIONALE SPA, on Viale del Lavoro, 57, 37051 Bovolone, Verona.
Pick-up hours are between 8:30 AM to 12:30 PM and 1:30 PM to 5:30 PM, Monday to Friday. We are closed on public holidays.

This is the current estimated market value for this item.

Manually set prices will be overwritten. Already listed wines are not affected.

Updates all unlisted wines to current market price.

Set all at market

represents all the wines you currently have in your Portfolio that aren't stored with us. Press the

My cellar

Name

Net price

New portfolio available

New portfolio

You do not have any invoices at this time.

shows all the items from your Portfolio that are currently on the market.

On sale

shows all the items you currently have in your Portfolio. You can perform individual actions on them from this page.

Overview

shows any items that are currently awaiting user action.

Pending

This is the dynamic market price of the item with trading margin removed.

This is the amount of profit you will receive if your listing sells.

Pre-authorised payments enable automatic transactions on your behalf, ensuring seamless and hassle-free payments. This allows recurring charges, subscriptions, or scheduled payments to be processed without manual approval each time.

The number of cases you wish to place on sale

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Your catalogue items will be archived. Are you sure you want to continue?

Before you request delivery, you can adjust the quantity for each item in your selection below.

*Market price is dynamic and may change. At time of sale a 10% trading fee will be deducted from the final sale price.

Total market price*

The fixed custom price you wish to sell each item for.

Split into {caseSize} individual {bottleSize}cl bottles.

Title

shows all the items you currently store with us. These items can be sold.

Available for sale — items stored with {name} eligible to be listed on the marketplace.

Profile

This item is at FINE+RARE, available for storage, transfer or delivery.
 Most UK deliveries can be made within 3-5 working days, with next day delivery for London;
 an exact date will be available when arranging delivery.
 International deliveries have longer lead-times, please contact us for details.

This item is at FINE+RARE HOME Hong Kong, available for delivery or local pickup. Most Hong Kong deliveries can be made within 3 working days, an exact date will be available when arranging delivery. International deliveries have longer lead-times, please contact us for details.

Wines sold en primeur will be released from the producer after bottling, typically 18 months after the so-called campaign ends. Your wine will then be stored by FINE+RARE in a bonded warehouse until you decide to take delivery.

We will source this item at the guaranteed price from our network of suppliers and arrange expedited shipment to FINE+RARE.
 The lead-time depends on many variables, but 2-4 weeks is typical for expedited sourcing.
 Once your order is confirmed, we'll keep you updated on its ETA.
 Every item is checked on arrival by our expert team, with photographs available on request (please note that charges may apply).

We will source this item at the guaranteed price from our network of suppliers and arrange shipment to FINE+RARE.
 The lead-time depends on many variables, but 6-12 weeks is an average estimate.
 Once your order is confirmed, we'll keep you updated on its ETA.
 Every item is checked on arrival by our expert team, with photographs available on request (please note that charges may apply).

Churchill Graham

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