In 2017, Patrick Johnston and Sara Cunningham thought working a harvest “one time” would be fun. So, they went to Savigny-lès-Beaune to do that at Maison Harbour… and never really left. They started making wine for themself in 2020, at the Maison Harbour facilities. In 2020 they made 4.5 barrels. In 2021, after a pretty small vintage, they made 2 barrels. It was a difficult harvest that year and “they were the last person on everybody’s list for fruit”, Patrick says ruefully. In 2022 they were finally able to grow production and they made 17 barrels, just under 5,000 bottles over 6 cuvees, production here is microscopic, with never more than 1,000 bottles per cuvee. 2023 will see them make 25 barrels, where they plan to stay.
Si Tu Sais is a super small scale micro-négoce. Installed in the picturesque, just-off-the-tracks village of Chamilly, Patrick and Sara work hand in hand with growers who are working chemical-free and biodynamically. They buy top-quality grapes and make the wines they love to drink: clean, crisp and acid-driven with some spice and lift. During our last visit, Patrick cites Vincent Dancer as an inspiration but also says, humbly, that their wines are in the “modern Burgundy style”: low intervention but clean; wines with life and tension. The couple seeks purity of fruit, extracting gentle aromatics via low-temp fermentations and mostly old barrels for oxygenation. Whole bunches are used judiciously, avoiding greenness by managing the time when stems, which are rarely perfectly ripe, are left in contact with the juice
The name of the Maison, Si Tu Sais, references the intimacy of Burgundy and its close networks of growers and winemakers; it’s also a playful nod to “if you know, you know”. This is a winemaker duo who is open-minded, dynamic, and destined for allocation-only status. After just a few harvests they have already made world-class wine and they have ambitions to further refine the style, to be more selective with the appellations, and to continue to focus on quality rather than increase the quantity. We advise you to be in the know.
Distributed in UK to private clients and on trade only.
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