There’s nowhere quite like the French region of Champagne for a celebratory short break, which is why I’ve toasted two milestone birthdays there, as well as my son’s 18th. That said, I’ve also found myself returning to this delicious corner of France, where millions of bottles slumber in miles of subterranean tunnels, with no particular excuse at all.
In warmer weather it’s especially seductive: afternoons drift by in sun-dappled courtyard bars, a chilled flute in hand after a cellar tour.
It’s easy to reach too — Reims is 45 minutes from Paris by train and Épernay another half an hour.
The secret to a memorable stay is to book a room with one of the local producers, where you can enjoy an intimate cellar tour or tasting, or to pick a hotel that neighbours some of the region’s finest houses so another glass is never far away.
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1. Le 3 by Champagne Thiénot, Reims
Le 3 by Champagne Thiénot is a new hotel with a spa
You know a hotel is serious about champagne when you open the minibar to reveal not one but four bottles of its bubbly. And that’s just the warm-up at this new hotel in the capital of the Champagne region. Above ground are 12 pared-back bedrooms in pale oak, along with a small spa and a wine bar overlooking the rooftops. But the intrigue lies below in the workings of Champagne Thiénot, the family-run house founded by the former grape broker Alain Thiénot and now producing up to 300,000 bottles a year. In the interactive museum aroma stations will test your nose, while underground you can view the vast stainless steel fermentation vats, as well as row after row of bottles in the 16th-century cellars. Just as every good tour ends with a tasting, this one finishes with excellent fizz.
Details B&B doubles from £235, tour and tasting from £39
2. Le 25Bis, Épernay
All rooms at Le 25Bis come with half a bottle of champagnele25bis.com
The smartest stay on the Avenue de Champagne, Épernay, comes courtesy of this tiny guesthouse, where five elegant rooms with antique furniture sit above Champagne Leclerc Briant’s shop. A family suite is tucked beneath the eaves. All rooms come with half a bottle of champagne — and a glass at breakfast, of course, served in a room adorned with a tropical mural and overlooking the garden. Sip champers by the glass in the courtyard or walk 20 minutes to Leclerc Briant’s cellars to learn about its Abyss label, which matures deep in the sea.
Details B&B doubles from £287 (le25bis.com), tour and tasting from £39 (leclercbriant.fr)
3. Royal Champagne Hotel & Spa, Châtillon
Royal Champagne Hotel & Spa has a roof terrace and a Michelin-starred restaurant
Views like these from the rooftop terrace, the 47 rooms and the spa with indoor and outdoor pools, don’t come cheap. Overlooking a sea of vines, with Épernay in the distance, this hotel is styled like a modern amphitheatre for optimum visuals. Its contemporary bedrooms are in neutral colours so they don’t detract from the show outside. There’s a Michelin-starred restaurant beneath a gold-leaf ceiling while the brasserie flows out onto the roof terrace. Hire an electric bike to visit nearby Hautvillers, where Dom Pérignon lived, and book a visit to Leclerc Briant’s cellars in Épernay under the same ownership.
Details B&B doubles from £825
4. Maison d’hôtes La Chevalée, Hautvillers
Maison d’hôtes La Chevalée is close to the tombs of Dom Pérignon and Dom Ruinart
In the pretty hillside village of Hautvillers the former monks Dom Pérignon and Dom Ruinart helped to shape champagne’s future (you will find their tombs in the church, a few minutes’ walk away). La Chevalée guesthouse has four swish suites with contemporary touches — two have impressive exposed beams overhead — and they share a 16m heated lap pool in the garden. Guests receive a chilled bottle of the owners’ Pierre Fedyk champagne, and just moments away you can try the local producer G Tribaut, which has a tasting room overlooking the vines.
Details B&B doubles from £177
5. Le Logis aux Bulles, Verzy
With a champagne riddling rack turned into a coffee table in the beamed living area and old wine bottles used as lights, this little B&B in the grand cru village of Verzy, about half an hour from Reims, nods to champagne in many forms. The three bedrooms are the kind you’d be happy to see in a boutique hotel — but without the high prices — and have an automatic lighting system as well as modern bathrooms. One bedroom sleeps four. The owners Edith and Laurent Mouligneaux produce Mouligneaux-Gourdain grand cru, and you can try a complimentary tasting and tour downstairs.
Details B&B doubles from £78
6. Le Château de Sacy, Sacy
Surrounded by vines in a tiny village 20 minutes from Reims, this château has walks from the door to independent champagne producers, with free tastings at Champagne Mobillion, whose vines lie immediately outside (champagne-mobillion-pere-et-fils.fr). The 1850 château — with no fewer than 54 windows to showcase the view — has plenty to see inside too, with crystal chandeliers and gilt-framed mirrors dotted around its 12 rooms, a superb restaurant/bar with a gold-papered ceiling and a sunny terrace. The boutique spa includes two hot tubs shaped like wine barrels where you can relax as you watch the sun set over the vineyards.
Details B&B doubles from £488
7. Domaine Voirin-Jumel, Cramant
Domaine Voirin-Jumel is a cheerful stay with three cosy rooms
There’s no better place to stay slap bang in the middle of the vines than with this champagne producer on the outskirts of the grand cru village of Cramant, a 15-minute drive from Épernay. The fourth generation of the Voirin-Jumel family make delicious bubbly, which you can taste by the glass in the terrace bar, or learn about in tutored tastings that range from a basic three glasses to a masterclass. The three rooms are compact and cosy, with small beds and tiny bathrooms, but they do the trick for a cheap and cheerful stay.
Details B&B doubles from £70, tour and tasting from £17 (champagne-voirin-jumel.com)
8. Champagne A Bergère, Épernay
Champagne A Bergère is a champagne house with a shop, tasting room and B&BAlamy
Names in the Bergère family tend to begin with A, and now it’s fourth generation Adrien and his sister Annaëlle who run this champagne house with a shop, tasting room and B&B in a handsome townhouse on the Avenue de Champagne. Choose from four classic rooms — wide-plank floors, grand mirrors and plush fabrics — or four modern apartments. Guests receive a complimentary glass of fizz (you can order more at the tables outside), and it’s worth booking the excellent tour of the cellars that formerly led to Pol Roger. To see its vines and champagne production, visit the house outside Épernay.
Details B&B doubles from £240, tour and tasting £35 (champagne-andrebergere.com), tour and tasting from £61
9. Les Crayères, Reims
Les Crayères is an opulent château©Julia Krikorian
There’s an air of refined elegance in this opulent château designed by Madame Pommery, minutes from Vranken-Pommery Champagne and Veuve Clicquot, both of which offer tours of their sprawling cellars. The classiest address in Reims, Les Crayères is set in a park all of its own. As well as 20 sumptuous, antique-filled rooms there is a two-Michelin-starred restaurant and a tartan-clad bar where guests can drink a complimentary glass of champagne — one of 1,200 varieties served at this Relais & Châteaux hotel. For more, Ruinart and Taittinger’s cellars are within a ten-minute walk.
Details Room-only doubles from £641
10. Champagne Philippe Martin, Cumières
Champagne Philippe Martin has a Nordic pod in the garden
You can refine your sabrage (cutting off the top of a champagne bottle with a sword) or take a tour of the vines in a 2CV at this champagne house a ten-minute drive from Épernay. It has three very French suites plus a separate living room and champagne-stocked minibar, as well as a wooden Nordic pod in the garden with a hot tub. The courtyard is the perfect place to sit and sample more of the 80,000 bottles the house produces each year.
Details B&B doubles from £161, tour and tasting from £17
11. La Villa Champagne Ployez-Jacquemart, Ludes
Enjoy a glass at the garen bar in La Villa Champagne Ployez-JacquemartChampagne-Ardenne Hotels
When you stay in one of the five colourful contemporary rooms at this old family house set in its own parkland, you’re sleeping above thousands of bottles of champagne that lie in the cellars 25 metres below. Enjoy a tour and a tasting or relax with a flute or two in the garden bar. The rooms share a cosy lounge and a buffet breakfast is included. Ludes in the Montagne de Reims is about a 20-minute drive from Champagne’s capital.
Details B&B doubles from £157, tour and tasting from £24
12. Manoir Henri Giraud, Aÿ
Manoir Henri Giraud is a manor house with a spa
For a truly local spa treatment, try a chalk wrap and bath while enjoying a glass of bubbly in this 19th-century manor house a ten-minute drive from Épernay. Craÿotherapie treatments (from £70) are among the offerings in the spa, which has a hammam and hot tub. You can book a food and wine pairing too (£235). Bedrooms are surprisingly modern, with splashes of colour on the walls and free-standing egg-shaped baths. The Pressoria champagne museum is a five-minute walk away.
Details B&B doubles from £427, tour and tasting from £100 (manoir-henri-giraud.com)
3. Domaine Sacret, Aÿ
Domaine Sacret has an honesty bar in the barn-style living area
In the same village as Champagne Bollinger, a ten-minute drive from Épernay, James Sacret’s 18th-century winegrower’s house has oodles of personality. In the barn-style living area, with its honesty bar and billiards table, huge posters portray family members. One of the four bedrooms has wallpaper decorated with giant bubbles while another is more theatrical, with antiques, a velvet love seat and a red curtain framing a free-standing tub. There’s a complimentary tasting of three house champagnes each evening and a slap-up breakfast the morning after, then it’s a short stroll to Pressoria, the region’s immersive champagne museum (£16, pressoria.com).
Details B&B doubles from £139 (champagne-sacret.com)
Jane Knight was a guest of Le 3, Le 25Bis and the Grand Est tourist board (explore-grandest.com). Take the train to Champagne-Ardenne
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