Domaine William Fèvre Chablis Premier Cru ‘Montée de Tonnerre’ 2020

Why is this Wine so Yummy?

Back in the early naughties, we were hoovering Chablis from the early 1970’s. When the Tsunami hit, wheelbarrows of Grand & 1er Cru’s were arriving from the auction at houses at around $14 a bottle. By the time it receded, they were up at a round $40 a bottle and still a bargain. Purity, complexity, amazing texture, lovely lines of acid were the hallmarks of these incredible wines. Testut et Fréres Grenouille featured! Such a great vineyard.

About William Fèvre

Fèvre is a major producer that boasts one of the most impressive arrays of Premier and Grand Crus. Didier Séguier has been head winemaker for several years now. Under Séguier guidance, the Domaine veered away from their rather zealous oak regime to a more prudent approach that mixes barrel ageing with stainless steel.

The domain uses old barrels with an average age of 6 years rather than new oak, in order to preserve freshness and minerality and enable the subtle nuances of Chablis’ terroirs to fully express themselves.

1959, the year in which William Fèvre declared his first crop, marked the birth of the domain. Descended from a family which had lived in the Chablis region for over 250 years, it was only natural that he set up as a winemaker with 7 hectares of vineyards.

Over the years the domain has acquired new vineyards in Chablis, all located in the historic terroirs. William Fèvre has become one of the biggest land owners in Chablis with 78 hectares of prestigious vineyards, of which 15.9 are classified as Premiers Crus and 15.2 as Grand Crus.

In the Vineyard

Fèver owns the largest array of Premier and Grands Crus vineyards in Chablis (39.29 acres Premier Cru and 37.56 acres Grand Cru)

Farmed organically since 2000 with selected parcels farmed biodynamically

In the Winery

Didier Séguier makes a range of wines with wonderful harmony. I believe the interplay of fruit, oak and texture can make or break a Chablis. And in the case of Fèvre, Séguier absolutely nails it. 

Across the board, the Fèvre wines offer a tremendous expression of place and season, plenty of minerality, power, energy and texture, all delivered with a real sense of balance. 

If you like classical Chablis with concentration and tension, these wines will take you to a happy place.

The 2020 Vintage at Fèvre

I was suitably impressed with the quality of the Fèvre 2020s and while they’re not going to rival the other worldly 2014s, they are indisputably excellent.

Régisseur Didier Séguier called 2020 “another hot and dry vintage though thankfully the winter was very wet, which certainly helped rebuild ground water reserves.

Potential alcohols were very reasonable at between 11.8 and 12.9%, which suits our desired wine style perfectly. Just as importantly, the post-malo pHs were  very good at between 3.1 to 3.2 so the wines have good freshness and vibrancy.

Another contributing factor to why they are so inviting is that the musts fermented out to extremely dry levels, which is to say between .5 and 1 gram of unfermentable sugars. As to the wines, the villages wines remind me quite a bit of the 2011s while the upper-level wines are more like a mix of 2010 and 2011.”

Allen Meadows, Burghound

The 2020 vintage makes the first year of official organic conversion for 78-hectare Domaine William Fèvre, though it’s actually the 15th year the estate has been practicing organic. Didier Séguier reported that the year’s challenges were twofold: having to pick harvest dates with unerring precision, and the necessity to sort out sunburnt grapes. The results, however, are once again exceptional, and it’s hard to think of any of Chablis’s larger estates that can match Fèvre for consistency and quality across the board. The 2020s, as ever bottled under Diam, are certainly built to evolve gracefully, but they will also show their cards sooner than the spectacular but hyper-concentrated 2019s.

William Kelley, The Wine Advocate

Detailed Map of Fèvre’s Chablis Holdings

Click on a map to enlarge 🔎