I got this email two weeks ago. I’m surprised nobody has mentioned it?
A LETTER FROM WILLIAM KELLEY
DOMAINE DU GRAND VALHow many producers in Burgundy achieve the same level of quality in white and red wine? If you reflect on that question, the chances are your list won’t be long. Mine certainly isn’t. And as someone with ambitions for excellence, I’ve carefully studied why this might be so. Leaving aside the fact that some producers may have a native sensibility, a personal preference, or a technical mastery that favors one color over another, I tend to think the reasons are simple. Working with one small winery—as Burgundian wineries tend to be—makes it hard to optimize process flow and cellar conditions for both colors; and when something’s got to give, one color wins out.
This logic lies behind the creation of Domaine du Grand Val, a new estate based in Auxey-Duresses that debuts with the 2026 vintage. Domaine du Grand Val employs the same methods in the vineyards as Domaine William Kelley in Pommard, but its winery and cellars are exclusively devoted to producing white wines. Domaine William Kelley will focus exclusively on red wines. (The red wine of Domaine du Grand Val and the two whites of Domaine William Kelley will be entrusted to their sibling properties for production.) While both wineries can operate independently—picking reds and whites on the same day if required—they both benefit from the same team of harvesters, pooled resources, equipment and expertise.
But why Auxey-Duresses? The answer dates to a sunny day in May 2018, when I first lunched with Lalou Bize-Leroy at her home in Saint-Romain. The first wine she served was a bottle of 2002 Auxey-Duresses Les Boutonnières. It was one of those revelatory moments (tasting with Jean-Marie Guffens in the Mâconnais for the first time was another, as were my first encounters in Oxford with old wines made when the Virot family were régisseurs of Domaine Leflaive) that take several years to digest and integrate. How could an Auxey-Duresses taste better than the vast majority of Bâtard-Montrachet? Trying to figure out precisely how continues to occupy a great deal of my attention.
Of course, Domaine du Grand Val’s attentions won’t be confined to Auxey-Duresses. Vineyards in that commune are surprisingly hard to come by and frequently poorly maintained. We have acquired, or are acquiring, parcels of Les Clous, Sous Châtelet and La Macabrée, but all three require partial or complete replanting. This will be undertaken, using the best massal selections at high densities, over the coming years, and their young vine fruit will complement our négociant production for some years after that. A decade from now, however, I hope that we will be able to release wines which show that my 2018 revelation was no mere flight of fancy but a true reflection of these terroirs’ potential.
In the meantime, however, we have found ourselves in the right place at the right time. In vineyard transactions, the confluence of means and opportunity is so rare that if it occurs once in a lifetime, one should consider oneself extremely fortunate. Such transactions occur on a generational rather than annual cycle, and they number among those blessings that are so rare that they really must be seized. Though our ambitions were more modest, it would have been a mistake to pass up great opportunities to take over some first-class terroirs in Meursault, Puligny-Montrachet and Chassagne-Montrachet. A small parcel of Mazis-Chambertin, in an homage that needs no explanation, will be the domaine’s sole red wine.
The inaugural 2026 vintage sees the range, much to my surprise, substantially complete; and if that is so, it has much to do with the efforts of my partner in this project, Florian Scatamacchia. Florian has worked as a vineyard broker over the last decade, so he has the connections to hear about interesting parcels, and a fine sense of when to “shake the tree”. Bringing his competences in house has been crucial to the domaine’s unprecedentedly rapid constitution. Many things in wine production unavoidably take time, and we are at ease with delayed gratification when it is required; waiting to acquire vineyards, however—in Warren Buffet’s phrase—seems a bit like saving up sex for old age. Happily, Florian has spared us that fate.
Most of our new parcels were already converted to high canopies, horse cultivation, and all the other agronomic practices we employ across the domaine, beginning in winter 2025. I am beyond fortunate to have been accompanied in this rapid expansion by our stalwart and passionate employees, now six in number, and to those who have invested in those vineyard parcels that were beyond my means. Much work remains to do, but I hope the wines will speak for themselves.