After extensive studies at prestigious winemaking institutions in Beaune and Switzerland and a gig at Chateau Pape Clement, Raphael Piconnet decided he’d be better off making wine like his grandfather, who spent his life rejecting the modern shortcuts of the 20th century. In 2013, he returned with his wife to the Aube to take over the family winery, where they’ve become one of the finest practitioners of low-intervention winemaking in Champagne.

Domaine de Bichery

The Piconnet family has tended vines in the Cote des Bar for three generations, dating back to Raphael’s grandfather, Charles, a dedicated farmer who ultimately sold his grapes to the local cooperative. Charles Piconnet chose a life in his vineyards, faithfully replanting from his own massale selections while his neighbors often reached for more productive clones.

Despite the family history, the story of Domaine de Bichery starts in 2013 when Raphael returned from his formal studies in Beaune and Switzerland. Tremendously inspired by the work and life of his grandfather, Raphael began converting the family’s entire production to organics. They achieved Ecocert certification in 2019 and are currently members of the Association des Champagnes Biologiques, where they are joined by a like-minded group of progressive wineries in Champagne (names like Charles Dufour, Amaury Beaufort, and Georges Laval).

Work in the cellar is decidedly hands-off, with some cuvees being vinified entirely without sulfur. The domaine is 8.5 hectares large, spread across 10 separate parcels, some of which are vinified into single-vineyard bottlings. Each wine is from a single vintage, something Raphael sees as a great challenge—starting fresh each year. Additionally, everything at Bichery is bottled Brut Nature.

In-the-know lovers of elegant, age-worthy Chablis are snapping up the delicious wine being released by Eleni and Edouard Vocoret. After meeting at a work placement in New Zealand, the couple returned to Chablis to run a small portion of Edouard’s family estate to great success. While originally focused on lieu-dit bottlings at the village level, they've since added 5 hectares, including several iconic premier cru and grand cru parcels.

Eleni & Edouard Vocoret

The Vocoret name has been dominant within Chablis dating back to the mid-19th century when Edouard's family first planted vines in the region. Edouard's historic family domaine now oversees 50 hectares of vines. His passion ignited by working harvest in New Zealand, where he and Eleni met, spurred the duo on to acquire 5 hectares of vines from the Vocoret family domaine, and set out on their own. 

Edouard had set his eye on a couple of choice parcels in the Chablis Village level vineyards, such as the Bas de Chapelot, a lieu-dit positioned perfectly just beneath Montée de Tonnerre. The first mission for the younger Vocorets: elevate the farming, creating healthier fruit with sustainable and biodynamic methods. 

In addition to Bas de Chapelot, Eleni & Edouard also produce from tiny plots of Les Pargues, Boucheran and Butteaux. Bas de Chapelot is situated in such a spot that creates great complexity, coming from 40-year-old vines deep clay & limestone soils mixed with the classic Chablisienne Kimmeridgian.

"The balance of fruit ,acid, texture and length this wine offers is nothing short of dazzling. I found myself wanting to drink the entire bottle with reckless abandon," While the couple has been mentored by Vincent Dauvissat, the wines do reflect classic minerals but genuinely do have a special intensity and density. "This wine has a bit of an unctuous quality that would pair brilliantly with sushi in my humble opinion."

Stefano Occhetti bubbles with energy, a childlike excitement for what he has discovered: the potential within Roero. His Nebbiolo sing with a similar energy, effusively aromatic and as delicate as they are intense. Stefano's early success infuses more dedication to allowing "Roero" to appear in place of "Langhe" for his labels, as he feels his vineyards carry a note distinct to the region which he calls home, and from which he has quickly created its leading wines.

Stefano Occhetti

To make wine is not a job, per se - you can see it as a passion, a mission, a way of life. Stefano Occhetti, however, views it as a story: “Telling the story, it’s almost a game…but a serious game, to tell the story behind it. Every year I write a new chapter.”

Stefano, a former civil engineer, admits that he started at zero when he started to spend more time in his grandfather’s vineyards in Roero. Though he grew up in the village, vineyards were more of a playground, but as an adult he started to notice how his family and his neighbors would work tirelessly in the vines. “My father was a builder, so the vineyard was never a focus - I was a drinker of wine, so I had an idea; but when I returned to my grandfather’s vineyard, I saw I knew nothing. And that was exciting!”

Quickly becoming entangled in the vines, he spent 3 months in the vineyard and decided never to look back; he quit his job, while his wife kept hers to support them. Stefano’s first vintage of his own label was 2019; he worked one hectare and made around 4000 bottles, largely by himself with some help from his wife. His uncle served as a helping hand, teaching Stefano how to prune and hone his eye in the vineyard, and with his friend’s help in the winery the first vintage was an exciting beginning. “I felt quite good in the winery if I made vinegar,” Stefano jokes, “But the objective was to make wine.” He emphasizes that last word, as he had fallen back in with an old friend who had taken up work as an oenologist, and together they drank many wines of their neighbors and surrounding regions to learn and develop a reference point for Stefano to start at. He admits he “was almost a stalker of [his friend] for a year, but he accepted it!” They made a good pair, as they shared an ideal: to make wine without dogma, and to make it territorial; local.

Looking at his native Roero, Stefano has a very clear view now of what he wishes to achieve, and what Roero brings: “Roero is freshness, but with structure. Maybe it is more Valtellina than Barbaresco.” He is battling the law to allow for a wine to be called “Roero Nebbiolo” rather than “Langhe Nebbiolo,” for that very reason - he feels, as we do in tasting his wines that the expression is exquisite and very unique to the region. Not to mention, many equate Roero with Arneis, the local white grape that for most is not held in high regard (outside of a few stellar producers). “Eight hundred hectares all around of each Nebbiolo and Arneis, but for me the focus is Nebbiolo; I make some Arneis, but it is not my focus - it does not keep the ‘Roero’ the way Nebbiolo does, and that is my objective: to keep the Roero, to feel it.”

Viticulture & Vinification

By 2022 the Occhetti winery was in full tilt, his wife quit her work to join Stefano full time, forming a true family winery; “A small team,” Stefano laughs. “Maybe in 2024 we will have a bigger team - one additional hand!” They together farmed 2 hectares, with another full hectare coming on line in 2025. 0.8 of the hectares are within Occhetti, which has been in the family for 80+ years; another full hectare of 70+ year-old vines are in Sanche which is 100 meters from their small house. Across all vineyards the vine age averages 40-50 years. With the old vines, Stefano admits he must continue to learn to be “More respectful, more caring for what I have. I’m not biodynamic, but, you could say I am BD-curious! I just hope to improve every day.”

Occhetti is smooth, full of limestone. Sanche is super sandy and steep, to the point that it can not be worked by tractor. This works out, as the rows are only 1 meter apart, the vines tunneling deep into sedimentary soils chock-full of fossils. Cover crops are planted throughout Occhetti but incredibly hard in the sands of Sanche, which he calls “the Rive Gauche of Roero.”

In the winery, all fermentations occur naturally in concrete botti; for the Sanche only, the cap is submerged, as the tannins are lighter and softer given the sandy soils. After moving to large oak barrels, Occhetti will age longer than Sanche, 32 months to 20 for Sanche. The Langhe Nebbiolo was originally aged 20 months, but Stefano has shortened the aging to 16 months, desiring even more freshness.

There’s a gorgeous natural complexity to what’s inside Stefano’s bottles. “When I say I look for complexity, this does not mean just structure or body; it means range of aroma as well - in Roero you can find a wine more complex than others, but maybe not so much of what we call structure.”

We’re introducing the wines of only his third chapter within the story, but Stefano’s a quick learner, and through his own experimentation has started to truly hone his vision for what he wants to represent with his wines, each bottle with that year’s story of the wine written right there for us to read.