Our buyer Amicie pulls out all the stops to unearth the little gems of the Burgundy wine region for you. Her latest finds are Maison A&S, Maison en Belles Lies, Chapuis & Chapuis and Antoine Lepetit de la Bigne. For this article, we interviewed these winemakers and micro-négoces to understand their philosophy and the wines they produce. Here’s an overview of these up-and-coming Burgundy names.
Antoine Lepetit de la Bigne: A fascinating encounter
Antoine Lepetit de la Bigne is an agricultural engineer and an oenologist, with a degree from the Ecole Polytechnique. He took up wine tasting at the end of the 90s and gradually became interested in biodynamic viticulture. He then began offering his services as a consultant to estates seeking a healthier, higher-quality viticulture. It must be said that he learned from the best. Between 2007 and 2015, he worked with Anne-Claude Leflaive. He also produced a vintage with Olivier Humbrecht.
His own wine-producing adventure began with the 2021 vintage in Burgundy. In this frost-affected year, he struggled to find grapes to buy and therefore started with very small quantities. His small wine-trading business, which focuses particularly on Côte de Beaune, has released wines from vintages 2021, 2022 and – most recently – 2023.
“Being a négociant is a bit like bringing up adopted children,” he said in our interview. Antoine takes a close interest in the winegrowers he works with, taking over from them for the winemaking and ageing. His approach is traditionally Burgundian:
- long fermentations of two to six months (four on average),
- malolactic fermentation,
- ageing on lees for 12 months, followed by three months in stainless steel vats after blending the different parcels.
Antoine takes a very minimalist approach in the winery, although he’s not dogmatic. He works with low levels of sulphur (some wines have 30 mg/L of total SO2, others a little more), to achieve white wines that are highly expressive from the very first year. In general, his whites are unfined and only lightly filtered. He works with a variety of containers, such as oak barrels, tuns, and porcelain or ceramic amphora.
In early 2025, he was able to take over a hectare of vines classified as the regional AOC Bourgogne appellation in Puligny-Montrachet. Of course, we’ll have to wait a few years to see the full results of the talents of this already promising winemaker.
The 2023 vintage, which is the latest from this producer to arrive on iDealwine, was bottled in December 2024 after 15 months of ageing. Antoine described 2023 as “generous because of its abundance (particularly for the reds) and solar (requiring harvesting in the morning due to the heatwave).” According to him, the wines from this vintage “show no austerity” and are “pleasant, fruity, and ripe.” He says that “while powerful and generous, the vintage also displays nice balance.”
See wines from Antoine Lepetit de la Bigne:
2023 Aligoté: “My favourite, a very concentrated, fine Aligoté, perfect for pairing with food, whose natural acidity combines with lovely roundness.” Made from 60-year-old vines planted at the foot of the Corton hill.
2023 Meursault Les Perchots: Made from 60-year-old vines, this is a classic Meursault, matured in 350L barrels. “The vines are planted at the bottom of the hillside on deep clay and limestone soil, with a predominance of clay. Clay brings great thickness and fleshiness to the wine, as it retains water well (which is invaluable with global warming).” The wine also retains beautiful finesse.
2023 Meursault Premier Cru Les Charmes-Dessus: Made from 70-year-old vines. “The climat of Les Charmes is known for giving a lot of power, but Les Charmes-Dessus is more balanced than Les Charmes-Dessous, with power, roundness and finesse, elegance and minerality.”
Chapuis & Chapuis: The work of two brothers
This estate is the story of two passionate brothers – Romain, an oenologist, and Jean-Guillaume, who studied law and management. Romain spent years training in winemaking, both in the northern hemisphere – where he worked for Burgundy’s Philippe Pacalet – and all over the southern hemisphere, meaning he could make wine twice a year. The brothers always planned to come together to create something together. In 2009, they made their plan reality, in Pommard, where they decided to set up their winery. At the time, they didn’t yet have their own vines. Today, the duo grows between four and five hectares and makes wine from 12.
Their approach is simple: “To make good, honest wines,” says Jean-Guillaume. To achieve this, they employ low-intervention winemaking methods, use very little SO2 (none at all during vinification since 2014), grow their vines organically (they are certified) and buy organic grapes wherever possible. Romain has excellent technical skills and adapts to the vintage. In the winery, the whites undergo direct pressing, and sometimes skin maceration, before fermenting in barrels. For the red wines, they work with whole bunches, destemmed grapes or even carbonic maceration, depending on the vintage. Chaptalisation (adding sugar to the grape juice before fermentation to improve the overall balance of the wine and increase the potential alcohol percentage) is never used. In terms of style of wine, finesse and fruit are the focus. The wines are very fresh (no lees stirring is done) and beautifully balanced.
To make their range easier to understand, the brothers have given their labels a colour code, with a white background for wines made from the estate’s own vines, and a black background for those made from grapes bought in from elsewhere. In addition, the wines released in spring feature a cock and a fox on the label, while those released in autumn feature a deer and a peregrine falcon on them.
Wines from Chapuis & Chapuis:
Coteaux Bourguignon red
Burgundy Montrecul white
Burgundy Montrecul red
Chorey-lès-Beaune white
Chorey-lès-Beaune red
Aloxe-Corton Premier Cru
Corton Grand Cru
Corton-Charlemagne Grand Cru
Maison en Belles Lies: An ode to simplicity and taking things slow
“I wasn’t a winegrower originally, nor am I from Burgundy. I had a great desire to move to the country, having always been passionate about wine. I didn’t know much about vines either,” says Pierre Fenals. However, at the age of 52, he moved to Burgundy and enrolled at the Lycée Viticole in Beaune.
After graduating, he worked for seven years at various estates, including Château de Marsannay, Rossignol-Trapet and Emmanuel Giboulot. During this time, he had the opportunity to buy small plots of vines. In 2009, he found a building and started a winery from scratch – “there wasn’t even a bucket,” he says – and produced 12,000 bottles in his first year.
Today, the estate covers two hectares in Burgundy (supplemented by several hectares under lease) and two and a half hectares in Beaujolais. In total, the winegrower farms around seven hectares, which he supplements with supplies from a few other sources, in Monthélie and Santenay in particular. Although not certified, the vineyard has been farmed organically and biodynamically from the outset.
In the winery, Pierre takes a low-intervention approach, with no fining, or filtration and just 1.5 grams of SO2 at bottling. For the reds, fermentation is gentle and slow, in truncated conical wooden vats, with whole bunches. Little punching down and pumping over is done. The whites ferment in the barrel after pressing and settling. Ageing lasts between 18 and 22 months, in 450-litre and 228-litre barrels, depending on the vintage and the wine.
Generally speaking, Pierre Fenals’ philosophy is an ode to simplicity and taking things slow: “We work in a manner of simplicity, with slow fermentation and ageing. We’re in no hurry. I try to make simple wines that are immediately understandable, with a typicity that resembles the appellation. Much as I have a little fun with the Vins de France, I also respect the climats, the plots and the AOCs.”
As for his last two vintages, 2022 and 2023, Pierre tells us that they were relatively easy – unlike 2024. In 2022, yields were decent, the vintage was sunny, and he intervened very little during vinification. The 2023 vintage – which will be bottled at the end of July 2025 – has slightly more tension than the previous one.
Shop wines from Maison En Belles Lies:
Vin de France Baie par Baie
Bourgogne Aligoté
Vin de France L’Etrange
Bourgogne white
Maranges
Monthélie
Aloxe-Corton
Corton-Charlemagne
Maison A&S: A young négoce outfit with the wind in its sails
“We’re two young Burgundians who don’t come from winegrowing families, but wanted to make wine,” says Alexandre. The adventure began for him and Pierre Alexandre with their first vintage, the 2018. For three years, the two neo-wine merchants made their wines in a cellar in Chagny.
In 2021, they acquired a winery in Nantoux, in the Hautes-Côtes de Beaune appellation, as well as a plot of Pinot Noir in the same appellation (in the climat of La Goutte d’Or). In 2023, they bought a plot with the Pommard Village AOC (En Bœuf) and just recently, at the beginning of 2025, they obtained a 0.66-hectare plot of AOC Bourgogne Pinot Noir (Les Sorbins) located at the bottom of Pommard. They have also just planted 0.1 hectares of Hautes-Côtes de Beaune Chardonnay in front of their winery.
In total, the two winegrowers own almost a hectare, buying in grapes to supplement their production, which is in the region of 20,000 bottles. They have no intention of stopping there and would eventually like to continue expanding their estate – but the price of land and the scarcity of plots for sale is often an obstacle. At the same time, Pierre-Alexandre works as vineyard manager at the Comtes Lafon estate, while Alexandre is cellar manager at the Thibault Liger-Belair estate.
Great importance is attached to the plant material, both for their own vines and for their externally sourced supplies. Tillage is done by horse to avoid compacting the soil, most of their external supplies are organic, no chemical weedkillers are used, etc.. The approach in the winery is a low-intervention one, with no inputs except a little sulphur (40-45 mg/L total SO2 for the reds and 45-55 mg/L for the whites), light extraction, and no stirring of the lees. The wines are aged exclusively in oak barrels, from the Aligotés to the Premier Crus. Barrels are three-to-five-vintages old so as not to mark the wines with wood, but rather to encourage the action of the lees and micro-oxygenation.
The two winemakers seek freshness, velvety tannins, drinkability and length in their wines. The red wines are made from destemmed grapes depending on the vintage and ripeness. Hot vintages such as 2018, 2020 and 2022 had a small amount of whole grapes to enhance their freshness, for example. As for the white wines, the regional appellations are bursting with fruitiness, while the village AOCs and premier crus show more richness, tension and minerality.
Discover wines from Maison A&S:
Vin de France Ysée
Bourgogne Aligoté
Bourgogne Pinot Noir
Bourgogne Chardonnay
Hautes-Côtes de Beaune
Hautes-Côtes de Beaune La Goutte d’Or
Beaune Mountain Saint Désiré
Maranges Les Bas des Loyères
Pommard En Bœuf
Gevrey-Chambertin En Reniard
Find all our Burgundy wines on iDealwine
