Footsteps echo in the darkness. The sentry cries out, ‘Halt, who comes there?’ The Yeoman Warder replies, ‘The keys.’ ‘Whose keys?’ ‘Queen Elizabeth’s keys.’ ‘Pass then, all’s well.’
For over 700 years, at exactly the same time each night (at 8 minutes to 10pm), the Chief Yeoman Warder of the Tower of London locks the gates of the Tower under the eyes of the duty regiment of Foot Guards then on duty, and proceeds to take the keys to the Queen’s House for safeguarding overnight. Only once, in over seven centuries, has the ceremony not occurred, during World War II, when a local bomb knocked a couple of warders off their feet. It continues unabated to this day.
The Constable of the Tower, General The Lord Houghton, invited friends and sponsors of the Historic Royal Palaces to witness this extraordinary and colourful ritual and Coates & Seely were delighted and honoured to provide the sparkling wines to accompany the small and intimate reception afterwards.”
The Craven is the curtain-opener not only for Newmarket’s beautiful Rowley Mile course but for the flat racing season more generally, featuring as it does many of the best flat horses in training. The winners of some of these races frequently go on to star in the 1,000 and 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket the following May and the Epsom Derby in June. Coates & Seely were proud to sponsor races on two of the three days and to introduce Albion – its vintage British Leyland coach, liveried in British racing green – to horse-racing for its first time out.”
Run since 1839, and watched by an international audience of over 600 million people in over 140 countries, the Grand National is the greatest steeplechase in the world and a central fixture of the British sporting calendar.
This year, for the first time in its 170 year history, the winning owner, trainer and jockey of the champion ‘Tiger Roll’ celebrated not with champagne but with English sparkling wine, provided by Coates & Seely.
For three days the fizz flowed at the Festival and both the racing and local Liverpool communities revealed an appetite and appreciation for sport and pleasure that rivals the fame of the race itself.”
English sparkling wine Coates & Seely has announced it is the new sponsor of The Jockey Club, which will see its wines poured at 14 of the club’s 15 racecourses.
The three year partnership was announced on 28 March and gives the home-grown fizz the pouring rights at 14 major British racecourses such as Aintree, Epsom and Newmarket which hold some of the biggest events in the British racing calendar.
As well as the punters themselves, Coates & Seely will also be offered to all winning owners and trainers after the races too.
At each race meet Coates & Seely will have an official presence as well in the shape of a classic 1952 British Leyland coach, liveried in green and off-white, and from which its wines can be sold to racegoers.
The bus, named ‘Albion’, was discovered by Nicholas Coates a mere three weeks ago in a barn near Brussels looking, “terribly forlorn”.
He recounted though that he had instantly “fallen in love” and all of his family had quickly become aware that there was “another woman in my life”.
He described Albion as looking like, “an aged diva or dowager,” that just needed some “Care and attention and her hair done”, which was accomplished in record time to allow a maiden cruise around Belgravia and Saint James’s in London on 28 March. Her first race appointment will be at Newmarket in April.
Commenting on the new partnership, Coates and Christian Seely, co-founders of Coates & Seely said: “We are delighted to have been appointed an official partner by the Jockey Club, which is a major accolade for our young brand. There are many qualities that connect fine wine with racing – not least the endless pursuit of form and quality and a love of celebration – and we greatly look forward to developing our activities across this wonderful portfolio of racecourses.”
Paul Fisher, chief executive of Jockey Club Racecourses, said: “It’s great to be working with Coates & Seely and we’re really looking forward to a prosperous partnership over the next three years. We look to support British producers on our menus and wine lists wherever we can and I’m sure our racegoers will be impressed with this sparkling wine. I know I am!”
With the same chalk soil as Champagne, Coates & Seely English sparkling wine shares many similarities with the famous French fizz but is also a unique expression of its unique terroir.
“We are standing on a rather magical piece of land,” confides Nicholas Coates, co-founder of English sparkling winemaker Coates & Seely, as we stand overlooking the rolling hills of the vineyard. Located in the North Hampshire Downs, the vineyard resides on the same chalk ridge that dominates the Paris basin and the Champagne region. “When we started, we sent a soil sample to the agronomy department at the university of Bordeaux — not marking where it was from — and the results showed it had come from Champagne. They were surprised when we told them it was actually from England,” says Coates. “In this sense we really are first cousins to the Champagne region.”
Once considered a fool’s errand, producing sparkling wine in England is now an established practice and even some of the great French champagne houses, from Taittinger to Pommery, have put down roots in English soil. For Coates & Seely, as with many of the French Maisons, it is the geological composition of the chalk soil that is the crucial factor. “The difference is that the humid, maritime climate in the UK means planting densities are half of what you get in Champagne, which means that the fruit yield is half and the wine more expensive,” explains Coates. “But the quality of the fruit we grow here is proof that it’s worth it.”
Established in 2007 by Coates, a former financier, and fellow Englishman the company began with a conversation over a bottle of wine, whereby Coates asked Seely whether he would consider producing sparkling wine in England. Not only wasSeely’s answer yes, but he had already drawn up a plan for it — although finding the right site was vital to the project. After scouring Southern England, they found a small vineyard a mere mile from Coates’ family home near Whitchurch. Overgrown and unruly, it had to be tamed before it was replanted (along with several additional acres in the valley) with Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier, the three grapes used to make champagne.
As English wine is still a young industry, with few sparkling winemakers in the UK having more than 20 years experience, Coates cites working with and learning from the French a key factor in successfully producing a wine. “We revere French winemaking and champagne, which is why we create Coates & Seely according to the traditional méthode champenoise — second fermentation in the bottle followed by the process of disgorgement.” Coates & Seely also works in partnership with a series of expert wine consultants, including Stéphane Derenoncourt and Arnaud Gimonnet, who bring a wealth of wine intelligence to the table.
“It’s always been about collaboration,” explains Coates. “At the very beginning it was a managing director of Axa Millésimes (owners of Château Pichon-Longueville and Château
Christian Seely, Suduiraut), collaboration between Christian and me. He made all the initial decisions about method and which winemakers we would partner with, while I worked on the financial and business side of things. Now it’s bigger than that: it’s a collaboration with all the winemakers and consultants we work with, too.”
Although much of Coates & Seely’s winemaking practice is rooted in the méthode champenoise, it is also subtly different in that some of the methods employed are traditionally used to produce still wine, such as the press technology used. “More commonly associated with still white wine production [the press technology] is particularly effective in emphasising the character of the fruit and aroma,” says Coates. “This is important if what we are attempting to do is express the individual nature of our fruit and terroir”.
Playing with the traditional process, Coates & Seely also ferments wine in four large egg- shaped concrete vessels, the likes of which are more commonly seen in Napa Valley. Enveloped in a thick layer of concrete, the eggs keep a more constant temperature throughout fermentation, resulting in a vin clair that has softer, fatter notes. “This gives us another colour on the palette to use when it comes to blending the wine. It makes the end result unique.”
Blending punchy vin clairs that won’t be drunk for five to ten years is a high form of artistry, one that requires in-depth knowledge of wine and how it will develop, an exceptional palate and years of experience, and is a stage undertaken by Coates & Seely’s top French winemakers. All the final decisions on wine, however, from blends to dosage levels and aging, are made by the duo, such as the decision to add less sugar to the wine as acidity levels in Hampshire are lower than in Champagne — something the wine consultants occasionally dispute. Despite this, “we work seamlessly and collaboratively with the winemakers, drawing on their experience and their artistry to produce wine to the highest standards”.
Paying homage to the shared chalk soil, the French winemaking influence and vintners involvement in the making of Coates & Seely, the bottles carry the designation “Méthode Britannique” on their labels. “We work with the French finding ways to express a different terroir that is unique and idiosyncratic. We are not trying to emulate anything else.”
