Champagne Taittinger, finestwine from the Champagne

Get to know Maison Taittinger in Reims, Champagne.

Taittinger is still one of the few Champagne houses to be owned by one family: Taittinger. From co-founder Pierre Taittinger in the 1930s to Vitalie Taittinger's presidency since 2020, punctuated by the heroic takeover of the House in 2006 by her father, the charismatic Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger, the House never ceases to defend a name (its own) that resonates, a know-how of the past while committing itself to the future. Producing champagnes of excellent quality, marked by Chardonnay, right up to the exceptional Cuvée Comtes de Champagne in tribute to the most famous of the Counts of Champagne, Thibault IV, Taittinger has many assets to rediscover, both in its prestigious cellars in Reims and in its Côte des Blancs vineyards.

The personification of the spirit of the Comtes de Champagne.

Maison Taittinger, one of the most recent Champagne Houses, has its origins in a Champagne wine trading house launched by Jacques Fourneaux in 1734. From that time onwards, he worked with the great Benedictine abbeys, which already owned the most significant vineyards in Champagne, since these abbeys had been producing outstanding still wines since the 13th century (the méthode champenoise - and therefore sparkling wine - was only invented in 1695 by the monk Dom Pérignon). Taittinger is located on the remains of Benedictine abbeys. But the House of Taittinger and its iconic dimension are above all linked to a man who was a young liaison officer during the First World War: Pierre Taittinger. An enthusiast for gastronomy and wine, he discovered Champagne during the conflict. At the end of the Great War, he returned to Champagne and, with his brother-in-law, developed the Champagne House, which did not yet officially bear the Taittinger name. From 1932 onwards - the year Pierre Taittinger bought the beautiful Château de la Marqueterie and its vineyard (the cradle of the Taittinger Champagne family) - the company began to grow in stature and take its place among the existing Champagne houses, gradually making a name for itself with a boldly innovative style based on the Chardonnay grape variety: Chardonnay is produced in the heart of the prestigious Côte des Blancs, in the best crus around the town of Epernay. However, Pierre Taittinger decided to settle in the Hôtel des Comtes de Champagne in the heart of Reims. Located on rue du Tambour in Reims, this 13th-century mansion preserves the memory of Count Thibaud IV de Champagne, known as “le chansonnier”, who lived in the Middle Ages from 1201 to 1253. His legend was so strong (legend has it that, on his way back from a crusade in Cyprus, he brought back the vine plants that were the ancestors of the Chardonnay variety) that Maison Taittinger decided to name its famous vintage cuvée “Comtes de Champagne”.

A decisive turning point for Maison Taittinger, signed Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger.

Although Pierre Taittinger left it to his sons over the decades to ensure the continuity of the House he co-founded, and to give it all its letters of nobility, the famous Champagne House very nearly disappeared from the Taittinger heritage. But Pierre Taittinger's grandson and Jean Taittinger's son - a true saviour and defender, with his family, of the family and entrepreneurial values that made Pierre Taittinger and his children so proud - moved heaven and earth and moved mountains to bring the House back under the Taittinger flag. Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger achieved this feat in 2006. One year earlier, the famous Champagne House was sold to the American pension fund Starwood. Unable to accept that the family business would cease to be orchestrated by the Taittingers, and that the savoir-faire of the past, signed with the Taittinger seal, would disappear, Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger (proud of his name) found, with the help of Crédit Agricole du Nord Est, the opportunity to buy the family business from the Americans. In the summer of 2006, Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger became the owner of Taittinger champagnes and rescued the emblematic House, taking the opportunity to surround himself with a team of employees ready to follow him on this weighty adventure - with its uncompromising, no-holds-barred goal of excellence - but a truly exhilarating one. The founder's grandson is well aware, as he puts it, “that having the Taittinger name on a bottle imposes a responsibility and a demand of every moment. And for him, “the Taittinger signature embodies both the know-how of the past and a commitment to the future." To achieve this, Pierre-Emmanuel, with the help of his loyal and dynamic collaborators, involved his two children from the outset: his son Clovis Taittinger and his daughter Vitalie Taittinger, thus ensuring, as with his teams, that they shared the same vision, the same course to cover all objectives and meet the various economic challenges facing the group and Champagne in general. Since January 2020, his daughter Vitalie has become President of the Champagne House (Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger sits as Honorary President of the Taittinger Group), thus bringing in new marketing orientations, including in terms of creation (the ability to create is at the heart of the DNA of champagne houses), while never straying from the family values that have always nurtured the Taittinger spirit. Last but not least, Vitalie and her family have a long-standing commitment to culture. The latest example is the creation in 2025 of Philanthropic ArsNova: an endowment fund dedicated to sharing the arts with as many people as possible, with the aim of awakening future generations to culture.

Expanding beyond Champagne: the English response.

Among the many challenges facing Champagne Houses (rising or falling consumption depending on the period), one of the most important is global warming and its impact on the expression of grapes, and therefore Champagne, in other words, the aromatic and taste style of each House. Taittinger is no exception to the rule, and in a way anticipated the pitfalls to come in this area by deciding at the end of 2015, not to invest in California or Oregon - as other Champagne houses have already done - but to seek out the freshness and minerality characteristic of great champagnes by investing not far from France: in the United Kingdom. Why the UK? For its soils, which in southern England are very similar to those of Champagne: chalk. And for its climate, although cooler and more humid (oceanic) than in Champagne. This calls for a few adjustments, but it's not an impossible mission, especially as the grapes there are currently much less affected by global warming. And for its cultivation (in terms of production and consumption) of sparkling wines, which (like Champagne) are a big hit on the English market, as far north as Europe. In late 2015, the famous Reims-based brand set its sights on Kent. An idea that was born in the minds of Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger and Patrick Mac Grath (Master of Wine) - during an exchange at Westminster Abbey under the portrait of Queen Elizabeth II - which resulted in the creation of a winery, Domaine d'Evremond.

The best vintages from Taittinger :

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