With their sixth wine and art blend for Pont des Arts a sell-out, the two young entrepreneurs reflect on the parallels between their shared passions
The end of May welcomed the sixth edition of the wine-meets-art collection of three fine wines in a custom-made lacquered presentation box, conceived and designed by Hong Kong-born project: Pont des Arts.
The story goes that six years ago, two French nationals working in Hong Kong made a plan to combine both their expertise in a fun project that drew on both their passions. The two in question were Thibault Pontallier, who was working for Bordeaux wine legend Château Margaux, and Arthur De Villepin—founder of Arte de Vivre, an art gallery and consultancy company. They brainstormed the launch of an annual special release of a small collection of three exceptional wines, pre-selected to be in harmony with a carefully chosen internationally-known artist’s artworks that would adorn bottle labels on archive-quality paper.
The annual three-bottled boxed collection, along with an additional later release of a quality spirit – also selected to complement the year’s designated artist, and bearing its own custom label are now in great demand.
So much so, that by the time Pontallier and De Villepin were in Hong Kong recently to meet with their local clientele, the global release of 100 sets for this year’s Pont des Arts trio of wine, featuring artwork by the late Dutch painter Piet Mondrian were all but sold out. Previous years saw larger editions, but Pontallier explains: “Year after year people saw what we have done, they trusted us and now we have managed to get an amazing access to some rare premiers crus and grands crus in many great terroirs. Obviously for such quality the volume is very small as it is rare and hard to find, exactly like the great artists we work with.”
This year’s encased special-edition bottles from Champagne, Burgundy and Bordeaux are indeed something special.
The Champagne Pierre Péters - Réserve Perpétuelle is a Grand Cru blanc de blancs, and the all-Chardonnay blend takes wines from more than 20 years of the house’s back-vintages. As a result, this is a complex blanc de blancs that builds and lingers on the palate. The artwork on this label is Mondrian’s oil on canvas Woods near Oele, painted in 1908. “Mondrian’s abstract works are quite famous,” says De Villepin, “not many people know that he started out painting very natural landscapes like this.”
