Les Monts Fournois

History of Champagne Les Monts Fournois

Born in Champagne into a family of winegrowers, Juliette Alips found her calling early on. Guided by her cousins Raphaël and Vincent Bérêche, founders of the celebrated Domaine Bérêche et Fils — an essential reference in artisanal Champagne viticulture — she trained in every aspect of champagne production: vine cultivation, winemaking, blending, and tasting.

Having graduated from the oenology school in Beaune in 2020, Juliette had already accumulated several vintages with respected producers such as Louis Latour in Burgundy, G.D. Vajra in Piedmont, and, closer to home, Maison Roederer, where she spent more than a year learning the codes of this storied institution.

Enriched by these varied experiences, Juliette Alips returned to Champagne with an exceptional technical and sensory background. With the unwavering support of Raphaël and Vincent Bérêche, she founded Domaine Les Monts Fournois, rooted in the eponymous Premier Cru lieu-dit at Ludes, which she intends to elevate to the ranks of the great expressions of the Montagne de Reims.

The first vintage of the Les Monts Fournois monopole will be 2022, with its release expected in 2027. While awaiting this landmark release for the domaine, Juliette offers a confidential selection of vintage champagnes from Grand Cru and Premier Cru vineyards, crafted thanks to the vast network of winemaker friends built up by the Bérêche family over the decades.

Terroirs and Vineyards of Champagne Les Monts Fournois

Domaine Les Monts Fournois is situated in the northern part of the Montagne de Reims, in the sub-sector known as the Grande Montagne, around the Premier Cru Les Monts Fournois at Ludes. This Premier Cru village, nestled between the forests and vineyards of the Montagne de Reims, benefits from varied exposures and clay-chalk soils that lend the wines a taut minerality, persistent freshness, and a remarkable capacity for ageing.

But the domaine's ambition extends beyond the sole terroir of Ludes. In its Selected Crus phase, drawing on the vast network of contacts built up by the Bérêche family and with the help of winemaker friends, a micro-négoce project was developed to create champagnes from purchased grapes sourced from remarkable vineyards in the Côte des Blancs, the Montagne de Reims, and the Vallée de la Marne.

Each grape source corresponds to a clearly identified geographical appellation on the label. The name of each champagne indicates the origin of the grapes: Côte refers to the Côte des Blancs, Montagne to the Montagne de Reims, and Vallée to the Vallée de la Marne; the name of the village or villages of origin also appears at the top right of each label.

Among the vineyards used for the current range, one finds Grand Cru parcels from Verzenay (Montagne de Reims), Cramant, Oger, and Le Mesnil-sur-Oger (Côte des Blancs), Mareuil-sur-Aÿ and Aÿ (Vallée de la Marne) — names that resonate like the cathedrals of terroir champagne. In Ludes itself, Chardonnay vines planted in the 1960s on the chalky soils of the Premier Cru form the basis of the domaine's Coteaux Champenois Blanc.

Winemaking at Champagne Les Monts Fournois

The winemaking philosophy at Les Monts Fournois follows in the tradition of the most rigorous récoltants-manipulants in Champagne, with an approach resolutely focused on expressing the vintage and the legibility of the terroir.

Each cuvée is crafted as an Extra Brut, with deliberately low dosages, often below 6 g/l, so as not to mask the native character of the grapes. The wines are aged on laths for exceptionally long periods. The Vallée NV cuvée, for example, spends 75 months in the cellar on laths before disgorgement. This choice of extended maturation imparts remarkable depth, complexity, and bubble integration to the champagnes.

Disgorgement is carried out on precise dates corresponding to fruit days in the biodynamic calendar, a attention to detail that betrays the influence of the biodynamic approach championed by the Bérêche family. The blending style varies according to the cuvées: some are single-variety, single-parcel wines of surgical precision, while others are inter-parcel blends conceived to reveal the complementarity of Champagne's terroirs.

Priority is given to purity, terroir, and thoughtful winemaking, free of artifice or compromise with fashion. Every stage of the winemaking process, from manual harvesting to tirage, from the second in-bottle fermentation to the prise de mousse, is guided by this demand for truth.

The Cuvées of Champagne Les Monts Fournois

The Selected Crus Range

This range constitutes the domaine's current offering, pending the release of the eponymous monopole. It brings together vintage champagnes from great terroirs of Champagne, each named after the geographical area of origin of its grapes.

Vallée – Champagne Premier and Grand Cru, Vallée de la Marne

The Vallée cuvée is a Blanc de Noirs crafted 100% from Pinot Noir, sourced from vineyards in Aÿ, a renowned Grand Cru of the Vallée de la Marne. Aged on laths for at least 8 years before disgorgement, it is an Extra Brut with minimal dosage, conceived to preserve the purity of the fruit and the deep expression of the terroir. The terroir of Mareuil-sur-Aÿ and Aÿ encourages a beautiful development of fruit. The wine is distinguished by its elegance, its structure, and the fine complexity of the Pinot Noir, with lovely notes of burnt vine wood, gentle spices, noble pepper, and dried fruits. A champagne of fullness and structure, an authentic testament to Pinot Noir on clay-chalk soils.

Montagne – Champagne Grand Cru, Verzenay, Montagne de Reims

The Montagne cuvée is a 100% Pinot Noir, Extra Brut, produced in only 1,000 bottles. It is sourced from a single parcel: Les Noues, in Verzenay, near the village's famous lighthouse. The Mailly soils, rich in red clay, give this terroir a strong identity. The essence of Verzenay is precision: vibrant freshness, fine ripeness, ferrous minerality, structure, and blood orange juice — a highly original expression of Pinot Noir.

Côte – Champagne Grand Cru, Côte des Blancs

The Côte range explores the different facets of Grand Cru Chardonnay from the Côte des Blancs, through distinct vintages and villages. Available editions include a 2016 Grand Cru from Cramant and a 2017 from Le Mesnil-sur-Oger, two of the most renowned villages of the Côte des Blancs. These slender, mineral champagnes develop a lace-like texture and deep chalk as a watermark. Notes of ripe nectarine, yellow plum, and lemon curd are met by accents of grated ginger, lime blossom, and pink grapefruit zest, with a final touch of gingerbread. Each Côte expression is an ode to Blanc de Blancs from Champagne in its purest and most ethereal form.

Coteaux Champenois Blanc, Ludes Premier Cru

The Coteaux Champenois Blanc is a still wine crafted from Chardonnay sourced from old vines planted in the 1960s on the chalky soils of Ludes, a Premier Cru of the Montagne de Reims. A very limited edition of only a few hundred bottles. This non-sparkling wine represents the most direct expression of the Premier Cru terroir of Ludes — the very place where the domaine's monopole is being developed. It offers a unique window onto what the estate's future champagnes will be: directness, mineral tension, vinous freshness, and the character of a wine built for long ageing.

The Monopole

The domaine's flagship cuvée will be the Monopole Les Monts Fournois, whose first vintage is 2022, expected to go on sale in 2027. Sourced exclusively from the eponymous Premier Cru parcel at Ludes, this cuvée will be the culmination of several years of relentless work in the vineyard by Juliette Alips. It will represent the quintessence of the project: one single terroir, one single family, one single expression, one single vintage.