It was in 2008 that Côtes de Blancs vigneron Stéphane Regnault, an aerospace-engineer-turned-sommelier, returned to his hometown Le Mesnil and began studying, tasting and plotting with the who’s-who of the region -- folks like Etienne Calsac, Flavien Nowack, and Benoit Tarlant, who opened his eyes to “the totality of winemaking.” Through their support and guidance, Stéphane made the decision to take over his family domaine in 2014. Since then, he’s ceased selling fruit to the co-op, converted and certified all the family holdings to organic farming, and began experimenting with biodynamic techniques. All the while, he has continued to iterate on his hyper-specific and idiomatic winemaking style, creating wines of stunning tension and energy that are, frankly, unlike anything else we’ve tasted.

Regnault’s holdings constitute 4 hectares of old vine and densely planted Chardonnay in three lieu-dits: Chemin de Flavigny in Oger, Moulin on the border between Oger and Le Mesnil, and Hautes-Mottes in Le Mesnil. Stéphane has farmed these organically since 2014, a decision he remains committed to, even after the disastrous 2024 vintage which saw many producers turning towards systematic intervention in a last-ditch effort to save their fruit from the rain. While he sympathizes, Regnault told us that he wasn’t able to compromise on his values. “It’s okay,” he says about his losses. “You try to make something and you don’t really stop.” Later on, he refers to the hardest vintage of his life as a “grower year,” which is the kind of euphemism that truly speaks to an all-encompassing vision.

It’s in the cellar, especially, where this vision becomes clearest. Stéphane favors a gentle bladder press, and keeps and vinifies separately the tails. He uses them not only to break in new barrels, but also to adjust acid levels on the final wines. He exposes the juice to oxygen to develop resilience and only moves the wines using gravity to avoid too much jostling. Sulfur levels are low – just 2 grams at crush and a similar amount post-disgorgement – not necessarily for ideological reasons, but because he hasn’t found much need, what with all the aging, high acid, and chalky soils. Chromatique, his youngest wine, is a true blueprint of the domaine, drawn from all three lieu-dits, raised in both wood and steel, and with a hefty lashing of a perpetual reserve. Year in and out, we find it to be one of our favorite assemblage Champagnes, and a fantastic introduction to Regnault’s precise and measured winemaking.

Being an accomplished jazz musician, Stéphane’s three parcellaires are all named after musical modalities, Dorien, Lydien and Mixolydien. The parcellaires are all made the exact same way - each vintage is raised in old wood and completes malolactic fermentation. From there, the vintage is blended with a site-specific perpetual reserve, which Stephane says is “a history of Champagne.” This blending is where the winemaker’s hand is most visible, Stéphane tells us, where the wine becomes true Champagne and not “Burgundy with bubbles.” In the cellar, Regnault’s love of the reserve is made clear – the current vintage barrels are labelled by parcel, but it’s the reserve that is given the cuvée name. The especially additive nature of his blends is reflected in his naming convention: each release is the sum of every vintage contained within it- e.g. Lydien 80 is a blend of vintages 14 +15 +16 +17 +18 in the bottle. Despite their identical techniques, each of the three parcellaire wines has a unique identity. Lydien is juicy and rounded,” almost like a balloon!” Mixolydien, in contrast, is more complicated with well-integrated minerality and depth. Dorien, in general, is the most linear of the three, a wine that Stéphane compares to a tunnel - straight and deep. All three, we find, are intensely moving and singular wines – certainly ready to wow right now, but with enough energy and power to age and further develop.

Despite his growing fame, Stéphane remains locked in to his work and fixated on constant iteration and growth. Although there are fantastic vineyards available nearby, he’s hesitant to add another single-parcel Champagne because he’s not sure if he could understand the plot fully, and also, of course, the sheer time commitment his methodology demands, telling us: “More important than making more wine is making better wine.”