Domaine Stephane Magnien

In a little over 100 years, Stéphane is the fourth generation of Magniens to live in, and work from, the family house and cellars whose facilities date from the late 1700’s. These premises were bought by his great grandfather, Victor Magnien, the son of restauranteurs who had a wine-growing grandmother in Morey. Victor wanted to work the vines, so apprenticed to another domaine in the village and, over years, slowly amassed his vines. Victor’s son, Felix, together with his wife took on the domaine: they vinified everything, though sold their product to the négoce. It was the next generation of Jean-Paul and his wife Marie-Odile who first started to bottle their own wines. Father, Jean-Paul, is still working hard with Stéphane. You will find a number of Magniens in the area (Michel, Frederic etc.) but they are not related to the Magniens of this domaine. The domaine is not just geographically centred on Morey St.Denis, their range of vines reflect that too, though a couple of Chambolles from the neighbouring village to the south and a Charmes-Chambertin from the north slip into the range. The domaine is a modest 4.5 hectares but has a mix of regional, communal, 1er and grand cru sites and across the holdings, vine-age is a creditable average of close to 50 years.

The Magniens are proud of the fact that their vines have never seen herbicides, rather they were ploughed by horse for many years until a tractor was bought in the 1980’s. Pruning and green harvesting is done by hand, as is the harvest when the grapes are selected (triaged) at the vine. Wine-making is described as ‘traditional’, though only the domaine’s aligoté keeps its stems, that said, Stéphane does work in a reductive way – in fact he was assembling and pumping over his 2007 Morey Villages cuvée to remove a little of that carbon dioxide when I visited. Stéphane has invested in new stainless-steel fermentation tanks to replace their 50 year old (at least) oak counterparts. The fermentations normally last about two weeks, with pigeages and remontages. The aim is not to force extraction, rather to produce wines which are “elegant, fruity, and full of freshness while remaining true to the terroir they came from“. The cuvées stay in barrel for up to 2 years before being bottled. Wines are normally placed in ‘new’ barrels (at this domaine that means 1-5 years old) for the first year before being racked into ‘old’ barrels (5+ years) until being bottled without fining nor filtering.