Grand Siècle: Laurent-Perrier’s masterpiece

Founded in 1812, Laurent-Perrier has been the forefront of creating refined and stylish Champagnes for over 200 years. The concept of this Champagne came from the ambitious entrepreneurial flair of Alphonse Pierlot, an ex-cooper and bottler who moved from Chigny-les-Roses to Tours-sur-Marne where he set up an estate, a business he left to his cellar man Eugène Laurent and his wife, Mathilde Emilie Perrier.

The name of the Maison as we know it today was adopted in 1887 after Eugène died and his widow Mathilde took over the estate. In a homage to her late husband, she united their two surnames to create the brand Veuve Laurent-Perrier & cie. After Mathilde died, in 1925, her heir Eugénie, due to financial difficulties caused by the World War I and the crisis ahead of World War II, sold the almost- failing business in 1939 to Madame Maire-Louise Lanson de Nonancourt, a sister of Champagne producers Victor and Henri Lanson. And family has been at the center of the Maison’s history, beginning when the farsighted Marie-Louise who, despite the difficult economic times, used her life savings to acquire Laurent-Perrier in order to provide a future for herself and her children.

An extremely determined woman, during World War II, when her sons Maurice and Bernard were at the front, she hid her 100,000 bottle of wines behind a wall to keep them safe until they returned. Unfortunately, Maurice was killed in the concentration camp of Oranienburg, while Bernard survived and after the war learned the Champagne business as an apprentice at Lanson and Delamonte. In 1949, Bernard de Nonancourt took over ownership and management of Laurent-Perrier and became its driving force, developing the Maison’s winemaking style and setting the path for its future. He did this by first opting to make the wine in stainless steel vats and then with the creation, in 1958, of the first multi-vintage Cuvée de Prestige, the celebrated Grand Siècle. Before his death in 2010, Bernard de Nonancourt worked with a number of inspired chefs de cave including the Champagne native Edouard Leclerc, then starting in 1975 Alain Terrier and, finally, Michel Fauconnet, who today runs production of the biggest, family-own Champagne brand.

Grand Siècle was the first cuvée de prestige not to be made with wines from a single vintage and, in order to have the best of the best, it is a synthesis of three exceptional vintages which bring together intensity and elegance. The first three-year blend was the one of 1952, 1953 and 1955, for which a special bottle with a long neck, inspired by a style used in the court of Louis XIV, was adopted.

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