🏛️ Champagne Hillsides, Houses and Cellars

Champagne Hillsides, Houses and Cellars is a group of hills, wine houses and chalk cellars in the Champagne region of north-eastern France. Since 2015 it has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It includes three parts: the historic vineyards of Hautvillers, Aÿ and Mareuil-sur-Aÿ, the Saint-Nicaise hill in Reims, and the Avenue de Champagne in Épernay.

This is where the traditional method of making sparkling wine was born, with the second fermentation in the bottle. The soil here is chalk. Chalk holds moisture and releases it to the vine, and deep cellars with an even cool temperature are cut into the chalk itself. Wine matures in these cellars for years. Many cellars have become underground galleries kilometres long.

The Champagne hillsides are tied to chalk, to the chalk cellars of Champagne and to UNESCO heritage. Champagne lies in north-eastern France, in Western Europe. The site shows how land, human labour and craft created a famous drink.