The experience of the Dom Pérignon Second Plénitude unfolds in a high-definition universe, both intense and penetrating. Dom Pérignon’s energy signifies an art de vivre oriented towards the future, an intense personal freedom and luxury. Unrestricted, the experience is timeless, focusing on the essentials of the wine, and the essentials of Dom Pérignon, suggesting a territory of curved steel, modern and lively. This facet of the brand underscores the avant-gardism of Dom Pérignon. 16 years ago, the wine was created to one day project the future of the Second Plénitude, a differentiation with its share of surprises. Today Dom Pérignon in Second Plénitude uniquely sets the tempo, the pace of time. To take part in the experience is to exalt the ideas of the time - those that push concepts to the maximum in all their dimensions. Purified and drastic, the exploration of Dom Pérignon through the Plénitudes lives in the luxury of discretion, the absolute mantra of desirability.
The First Plénitude is revealed after at least seven years of maturation on the lees, depending on the vintage. The wine then embodies the perfect balance of Dom Pérignon, its greatest promise. This is Dom Pérignon Vintage, the Plénitude of harmony. The Second Plénitude asserts itself after a minimum of 12 years of maturation on the lees. In this window of expression, the wine is majestic in its Dom Pérignon intensity. Here it expresses its scope, its expansion. This is Dom Pérignon P2, the Plénitude of energy. The Third Plénitude then comes after a minimum of 20 years of maturation on the lees. The wine now fully embodies another dimension where its essence enters the unknown. This is the Plénitude of complexity. After three metamorphoses, Dom Pérignon’s uniqueness is almost completely revealed and accomplished. Such a process can exist nowhere else. This is Dom Pérignon’s own creation, the “Power of Creation”.
During each of the wine’s Plénitudes, with an enlightened sense of drama, certain Dom Pérignon traits are distinguished without ever denying the others. Thus the way in which the wine reveals itself is different each time, yet so close. This process is the expression of a true vision of wine and veritable work of its architecture. The Chef de Cave is the master.
The First Plénitude (in 2005) of Dom Pérignon Vintage 1998 was a model of balance. After a moment of weightlessness, the palate was awakened by a youthful energy. In its Second Plénitude, invigorated by the additional years in the cellars, sixteen years of elaboration in total, Dom Pérignon P2-1998 brazenly transcends the potential of the vintage. The opposing and complementary elements of the assemblage resound for an increasingly sharp intensity. The aromatic persistence progresses like a wave that stimulates the penetrating nature of the wine. The energy reaches its climax. Exalted in this Second Plénitude, the dark, mineral, iodine, spiced singularity of Dom Pérignon vibrates higher and clearer than ever. Here the dynamic of the transformation is palpable, given that one day it will project us even further.
Another sunny vintage, or the diversity of fully ripe harvests of 2006 vintage, Dom Pérignon has dared to create no less than its fifth successive vintage champagne. The climate has continued to warm gradually since the 1990s. To date, the benefits for Champagne are unanimously recognized: in addition to more regular yields, we have also seen an improvement in ripeness and vineyard conditions. Of this unprecedented series of five vintage champagnes, four were harvested at a stage of intense ripeness. Such frequency has not been reported in more than three hundred years of champagne harvests. Yet to characterise full ripeness is complex. It embodies as many expressions all strongly affirmed as there are vintage champagnes.
Dom Pérignon Vintage 2006
The weather in 2006 was mixed, but warm and dry overall. While July was scorching hot, August was unusually cool and wet. The almost summery weather in September made the vintage possible by drying out the few patches of botrytis and maturing the grapes far more than usual. The harvest began on September 11 and lasted nearly four weeks.
Nose
The immediate impression is of the mildness of the pure, airy, bright bouquet. A floral, fruity pastel tone then unfolds and quickly darkens into candied fruit, ripe hay and toasted notes, along with hints of licorice.
Palate
“The wine’s opulence contained and succulent, round at heart reveals itself in the mouth.” The envelope slides and stretches, and the wine becomes more complex and edgy, silkier than it is creamy. “The whole eventually melts into an exquisite bitterness tinged with the briny taste of the sea.”