This Oscars week is already in full swing with a wide array of celebrity-packed special events happening around Los Angeles, from the Green Carpet Fashion Awards and the Vanity Fair & Instagram “Vanities Party” to the United Talent Agency party and the Gold Meets Golden event, just to name a few – but this Sunday, the world will toast to excellence in filmmaking at the 96th Academy Awards – and for the third consecutive year, Fleur de Miraval remains the exclusive Rosé Champagne served during Hollywood’s biggest night.
Led by two-time Oscar winner Brad Pitt and the Perrin & Péters winemaker families, Fleur de Miraval, which sells for $300 a bottle, will be available to the nominees and other attending guests at the bar before the live show, as well as after the ceremony at the 65th Governors Ball. Even during the Oscars creative team press conference on March 6, Molly McNearney, an executive producer of the Oscars telecast and wife of Sunday’s host Jimmy Kimmel, said when asked about Fleur de Miraval, “We will be drinking a nice glass of Champagne at the Governors Ball.”
To better appreciate how this Champagne continues to make its mark at the Oscars, Fleur de Miraval’s Assistant Chef de Cave Alexis Blondel is sharing how the brand’s journey first began.
“It all goes back to the root of Pitt partnering with the Perrin family when he purchased Miraval de Provence estate in the south of France. It all started there as a joint venture. Then, they partnered with Péters to create Fleur de Miraval – that was Mr. Pitt’s original idea to create a house only dedicated to Rosé and a house in Champagne,” which is the only French region where this type of wine product can be appropriately referred as Champagne.
“Not everyone knows about Napa or Bordeaux,” Blondel said. “Champagne is like an international word that everyone knows. What makes us so different is we’ve come up with a blend that has never been done before. We’re not blending white and red wine – we’re blending white wine and Rosé wine. It’s a very, very specific technique.”
Blondel added of Pitt’s involvement and the entrepreneurial environment he has created for other creatives on his French estate, “He’s really into art and he’s crafting the Miraval estate. We have wine, obviously, but we have a music studio and there’s a house in the back of the estate where writers can come to write, there’s painters who can come to paint. The music studio is really dedicated to welcoming the most famous artists in the world, so he’s really into this craftsmanship and the artistry.”
He went on to stress that Fleur de Miraval is not a celebrity brand and that Pitt is a collaborator alongside Péters and Perrin – “more in the background. He knows we are the experts for this, but he’s really curious and passionate.”
As for the significance of the three intertwined “P” letters displayed on the Fleur de Miraval bottle, it signifies the Pitt, Perrin and Péters families combining their individual resources in creating the Rosé Champagne. Blondel, who is an integral part of the creation process for many months and years on end, describes its taste as “creamy, almond-y, super delicate and the Rosé just brings this touch of citrus and strawberry. It’s very one-of-a-kind. I’m in love with this Champagne, I truly am. I’m tasting some everyday, but it’s never boring. The profile in your mouth is so unique.”
With Fleur de Miraval early editions ER1 served during the Oscars in 2022 and ER2 served in 2023, this year’s 96th Oscars will showcase the Champagne’s latest ER3 edition. Blondel teases that this coming September, Fleur de Miraval will release ER4 and that back at its French estate, they are about to blend ER8, which he says will be released to the public in 2028, saying that it takes around four to five years for each new edition to be ready to be enjoyed.
When asked about the reasoning for the higher $300 price point for Fleur de Miraval, Blondel said, “The old bottle of Champagne for ER3, we opened in 2000. We opened them one-by-one, put it back into the tank and put it back to the final blend. It’s very unique – it takes a long time to make. It takes people, it takes craftsmanship. There’s no market on sourcing old bottles of Champagne. So for us, Fleur de Miraval, the project itself, it’s really costly because we’re recreating an estate, we’re recreating a cellar and sourcing a very old bottle of Champagne.”
If the general public is seeking a more reasonable Champagne bottle to drink while tuning in to the globally televised Oscars event on Sunday, Blondel suggests their Petite Fleur, a brand new Cuvée selling for around $100. “It’s a blend of white wine and red wine, lots of fresh Chardonnay. The technique we use is simpler – it’s not as complex and therefore, it’s more affordable. It’s flowery, has a beautiful bitterness, citrusy – it’s very vibrant. It’s a lifestyle Champagne.”
As our conversation concluded, it felt necessary bringing up with Blondel the obvious parallels between the look of the Fleur de Miraval bottle, with its vibrant pink label and its sleek black design, and the indisputable moviegoing movement over the past year between Oscar nominees Barbie and Oppenheimer with its widely recognized “Barbenheimer” phrase. Does he notice the playful comparison this year?
Blondel said, “Absolutely! We are associating that we are a craftsmanship product, such as cinema, so it’s more about the common link we have with cinema. It really makes sense for us to be at the Oscars, not just because one of our partners is Brad Pitt, but as a small boutique craftsmanship, I really think there’s a beautiful link to be made with the silver screen.”
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