A follow-up to our Altenbourg offer: we sold everything we had available in minutes, and while we can't get anymore of that one, we do have a nice grand cru selection from this domaine today at this fantastic price. This is another beautiful dry Alsatian Riesling from one of the region’s most exciting young estates, founded in 2017 by Charles Sparr, a multi-generational winemaking member of the Sparr family, and Amélie, from the Barmès-Buecher winemaking family. This cuvée is drawn from the granite soils of the Grand Cru vineyard 'Brand', a site especially renowned for Riesling and long prized for producing wines with excellent depth and energy. The Sparr family’s parcel in Brand dates back to the 1960s and sits adjacent to Zind-Humbrecht's, giving it great positioning within the vineyard, and has been biodynamically and organically farmed for almost 20 years. The wine is made with a manual harvest, slow pressing, natural fermentation in stainless steel, and a year on the lees, all of which suit the domaine’s polished, terroir-driven style. 2020 is especially compelling as one of the best made here, emphasizing both the site’s natural concentration and a notably cool, mineral line with citrus, stone fruit, crushed rock, and intense salinity, with the kind of focus, structure, and aging potential that make top dry Alsace Riesling so rewarding. With Trimbach and Zind-Humbrecht's bottlings from the Grand Cru Brand vineyard going for double to triple the price, this is a fantastic way to get to the grand cru level while rubbing shoulders with two of the best estates in Alsace.

James Suckling 95 pts! Such an elegant wine for this Grand Cru that tends towards aromatic richness, the pineapple and basil notes very delicate on the nose. On the medium-to full-bodied palate there’s more succulence, but even there the crushed-stone minerality keeps everything very cool and straight. Very long, focused finish with so great vitality and very fine tannins. From biodynamically grown grapes with Demeter certification. Drink or hold.

Vinous 94 points! "Charles Sparr is the eighth generation of the Sparr family in Alsace. His ancestor Pierre Sparr initially arrived from Germany in 1820. Sparr’s descendants founded the big négociant business Charles Sparr in 1892, which traded until 2007, when it was sold to the cooperative in Beblenheim. The current Charles Sparr was in the middle of his oenological studies in Beaune and had just returned from a stage working for Mumm Napa/Pernod Ricard in California. Sparr’s grandfather asked him to return home to Alsace, and Sparr said he would on the condition that he could convert the vineyards to organic farming. Sparr’s first harvest was in 2010. He met his wife Amélie Buecher in the same year while she was running Domaine Buecher-Fix with 8 hectares/20 acres of vineyards. In 2017, when Sparr’s family domaine was certified organic and biodynamic by Ecocert and Demeter, respectively, the couple united the two domaines and named their new 19-hectare/47-acre-estate Amélie & Charles Sparr. They have holdings in Hengst, Brand, Mambourg, Furstentum, Sporen and Schoenenbourg Grand Crus and in the Altenbourg and Rosenberg lieux-dits, which Sparr refers to as their premiers crus. Altogether, there are more than 100 plots across 11 villages. Here there is much ambition and ambivalence. The couple wonders whether they should leave the appellation and label all their wines Vin de France as they feel constricted by many regulations, such as the mandatory use of flute bottles. They think this puts them at a marketing disadvantage and groups them with what many consumers still perceive as an old-fashioned Alsace style. Alsace, however, is in great need of more up-and-coming youngsters that change the perception of this appellation from within. We can look forward to experimental Sciaccarello and Nielluccio, native grapes from Corsica, from this estate. The wines are precise and delicious, made by one of the most ambitious new estates to emerge in Alsace.

Alsace

2019 Domaines Schlumberger Gewurztraminer Les Princes Abbés

2020 Domaine Amélie & Charles Sparr Riesling Brand Légende

2021 Domaine Amélie & Charles Sparr Riesling Altenbourg