Delamain


If you spend a lot of time on tube station platforms you won`t have missed those adverts for misspelt whiskey, of which the makers claim everything happens slowly. Well, let’s hope no trading standards officer who has been to Delamain reads that! By contrast at Delamain’s HQ in Jarnac time stopped about a century ago. There have in fact been two changes in that time – a slight change of name for one of their XOs and recently, in a dramatic and shocking about turn a vineyard was acquired. At a rough guess, you’ll be able to taste the fruits of that vineyard in about 50 years, so no breath-holding please.

It is time that Delamain has on its side. Now they’ve got through the first 150 years of building up stocks, such that they have enough to give a management accountant nightmares long into retirement, the dimension of time is tightly incorporated in their ethos and in everything they do. Because time is what they do, it is the business model. Only time gives them the alchemist’s ability to turn already great eaux de vie into the greatest Cognac. Only time shows the greatness of the Grande Champagne terroir from vineyard into (eventually) bottle.

Young Irish adventurer James Delamain arrived in Jarnac in 1759 and in 1824 his grandson Henri founded Maison Delamain. 200 years of producing small quantities of exclusively Grande Champagne Cognac with vast amounts of age have given them an unassailable reputation. (CW 07/10/19)