Orange was the colour of her dress 2023

‘Orange Was the Color of Her Dress, Then Blue Silk’ is a Charles Mingus composition — the kind of title that sounds like a painting and plays like a mood. The wine Jura producer Patrice Béguet named after it is something similar: an orange wine that doesn’t look like one, made in a way that reframes what skin contact can mean.

Orange wine from Jura?
Patrice Béguet farms around four hectares of holistically-farmed estate vines in Mesnay, near Arbois, including parcels on the Côte de Feule in Pupillin. This wine is 100% Savagnin and is given six months of skin contact in large barrels.  The result is a wine with the cloudiness of an amber wine but an ethereally pale colour: not the deep amber most expect from six months of skin contact, but something closer to hazy white gold. No sulphites added too..

 
We have not yet tried this wine but hear that the nose is enchanting and unhurried with notes of white flowers, melon, a hint of beeswax. The palate is meant to give white apricot, morning dew, and a faint herbal undertone that feels distinctly Jurassic. There is texture, you feel the six months of skin contact in the weight and presence of the wine, but no heaviness, no astringency.

Patrice Béguet left a career as an IT consultant in Paris to return to Mesnay, near Arbois in the Jura, where he was born. Demeter certified. Around four hectares of holisitic estate vines, Ploussard, Trousseau, Savagnin, and Chardonnay,  including plots on the famed Côte de Feule in Pupillin and Les Corvées in Arbois. No added sulphites. Every wine is named after a piece of music he loves. He also has a Negoce project where he is quite experimental with his cellar work!