Last week in the Champagne, I was able to get my first–and hopefully not my last–glimpse of one of wine history’s most fabulous finds in recent history: one of the shipwrecked Veuve Clicquot bottles. We all know by now that these sunken treasures were found by divers on the bottom of the sea in the Baltic, off the coast of the Åland Islands of Finland. The most recent historical evidence suggests that they date from the 1830s or 1840s–and that means that they are bottles the Widow Clicquot herself would have crafted. The name of the sunken ship hasn’t yet been discovered, and until then the precise date, their destination, and the name of one seriously disappointed purchaser will all remain on hold.
Two of those bottles will be auctioned off tomorrow, June 3, along with several lots of rare Veuve Clicquot vintages offered by the maison. Proceeds will go to charity, and the auction house Acker Merrall & Condit, have set a minimum price of 10,000 euros for the lots. But experts anticipate that they may go as high as a 100,000 euros a bottle. Needless to say, I am actively encouraging all my friends to buy me a bottle.
For those of us who can’t make it to the Åland Islands this week for the auction (and what, miss the Veuve Clicquot Polo Classic in New York?) but want to see one of the special bottles, one will be on display–this year only–at the Veuve Clicquot maison in Reims, France. You have your holy grail out there maybe. I know where to find mine. ;–)
