The third vintage since taking over the estate, a motivation like in the early days. Between anecdotes and technical data, Armand tells you about his 2015 vintage.

Let's set the context with some general data on this vintage.

2015 in Burgundy

The 2015 vintage in Burgundy is:

• Cumulative precipitation between September 2014 and September 2015: 800 mm
• Cumulative precipitation from April 1 to September 30 over the vegetative cycle: 380 mm
• Flowering at the end of May, as in 2014
• Budding on April 21

Average temperatures over the vegetative cycle were 18°C, which is normally around 16°C.

The 2015 vintage, the year of surprises

The 2015 vintage is the first year in which I take care of the vines and the estate full-time, with an employee at my side to support me full-time.

The estate has grown again to 5 ha with plots of Pommard 1er Cru Pézerolles and Volnay 1er Cru Taillepieds. These two magnificent terroirs belonging to the family were previously worked by my cousin Charles Ballot in Meursault.

The 2012, 2013 and 2014 vintages having been strongly impacted by hail, I decided this year to experiment with an anti-hail net on part of our Pommard 1er Cru Rugiens, Pommard 1er Cru Clos of Poutures and Volnay 1er Cru Taillepieds. This technique has already shown excellent returns in the past in many other wine producing regions as well as in arboriculture.

This allows us to lower the nets easily with a crank. After 5 years of experimentation, we can say that today, the system has adapted well to our way of working.

Mother nature finally decides to no longer impact with hail the vines equipped with nets. Nature is well made it seems.

The season finally went fairly quickly with less stress than for previous vintages. Maybe it's the job that's starting to come in.

The samples of maturities quickly tell us that we will have to start the harvest at the end of August to obtain musts balanced in sugar and acid. We take the decision to start the harvest on August 27 with the Chevalier-Montrachet. The analyzes reveal a perfect balance and the juice yields are good. A vintage that promises to be great!

Thanks to stable weather during the harvest, the plots will be able to be harvested at perfect maturity, for both the whites and the reds.

The style of my wines for this 2015 vintage

Despite the sunny character of this vintage, the acidity is good. However, the first journalistic feedback on the vintage will not be very positive, either for the whites or the reds.

At the estate, the whites have certainly been flattering in their youth, but during a blind tasting I recently surprised some very good friends thinking about the freshness of a 2014 vintage.

The 100% whole harvest on our reds allows us to preserve elegance and finesse in youth to, over the years, take on intensity, depth and fruit.

Armand Heitz