Steven Spurrier 1941-2021
A Remembrance from Richard Leahy
March 10, 2021
Steven Spurrier, a leading British wine writer, gentleman, author, art collector and wine expert, passed away on March 9th. He was most famous for engineering the 1976 “Judgment of Paris” blind tasting in which top Napa Valley Chardonnays and Cabernet Sauvignons soundly out-performed their French counterparts, giving Napa Valley wines (and by extension, others from California) instant respectability on the world wine stage.
Interestingly, the same wines were tasted again a decade later with much the same result, and again, 30 years later, with little change.
Steven bought his Paris wine shop, the Cave du Madeleine, in 1970, and established a wine school there, the Acadamie du Vin, in 1973. The Academie became influential in training a generation of wine professionals whose careers rose together with the increasing consumer culture of wine in the 1980s. He also designed and ran the wine course for the British auction house Christie’s.
Steven was a member of the prestigious Circle of Wine Writers, which he also chaired at one time. For many years he was a regular columnist for the British consumer wine magazine Decanter, where he was described as “a renowned taster.” Spurrier wrote several wine books; The Wine Cellar Book (1986); The Académie Du Vin Wine Course (2nd edition; 1990); The Académie Du Vin Guide to French Wines (2nd edition; 1991); Clarke & Spurrier’s Fine Wine Guide (2nd edition; 2001).
After fifty years in the wine trade, he and his wife Bella became winegrowers and members of the very new English wine trade with Bride Valley, a vineyard and winery making fine sparkling wine in the champagne method. Located in the English countryside of Dorset, the vineyard is south-facing, and as he pointed out to me, the soil is not only limestone, as with many fine French wine regions, but specifically Kimmeridgian limestone, which is found in the southern Aube region of Champagne. Bride Valley’s first vintage of 2011 was released after three years on the lees, and sold out promptly.
His last book, A Life in Wine, was published in 2020. One remarkable feature of the book is “A few words about Steven;” it runs to 39 pages (!) and has entries from 24 colleagues. They include international winemakers, Masters of Wine, fellow wine writers and friends. All testify to his personal generosity, his passion for wine and for helping others to learn about it, his graciousness, and his consistently impeccable taste in dress. I never saw him in shirtsleeves or without a pocket handkerchief.
I first met Steven when he attended the Virginia Wine Experience in London which brought 64 curated Virginia wines to London for a tasting in 2007 (disclosure: I was Executive Director of the event). “I can remember Hugh Johnson, Jancis Robinson and Andrew Jefford remarking how good the wines were and (this is important) how nice the people were presenting them,” he wrote in the foreword to the third edition of my book Beyond Jefferson’s Vines: the Evolution of Quality Wine in Virginia (2020).
Steven concluded his address at the Wine Summit by telling the audience, “Virginia is my favorite North American wine region today, because it makes the kinds of wines I like to have a second glass of.” He went on to join me as a judge in the annual Virginia Wine Governor’s Cup competition from 2015-20.
Tassie Pippert of James Madison University and Shari Pennington of Virginia Public Media have been producing a public television program called “Un-Wine’d” about Virginia wine and the people making it. I was honored to be included in an episode discussing Thomas Jefferson and his vision for Virginia wine. I put them in touch with Steven who agreed to be interviewed via Zoom, which thankfully took place just a few weeks ago and will be featured in the upcoming season.
I am grateful to Steven for agreeing to write the foreword to my new third edition of Beyond Jefferson’s Vines, and for his willingness to taste the wines of an unknown region with an open mind and palate. He then gave his blessing to the winemakers and grape growers who have worked diligently for decades to put Virginia wine on the map of quality wine, where it now belongs.
He concluded his foreword to my book by writing “For me, quality wine is the 3 “P”s: P1 is the Place, P2 are the people, and P3 is the product, which should always reflect the truth and honesty of the first two. All recognized wine regions across the world are a mirror of this and, as Richard Leahy will tell you in this third edition, so is Virginia.”
Bartholomew Broadbent, a wine importer and distributor based in Richmond, son of the late Michael Broadbent MW, noted in a Facebook post that Steven was a huge influence on his life. “Steven has always been incredibly kind to me… Over the years, my friendship with Steven grew. It is not easy transitioning from knowing someone as a friend of your father’s to accepting that a genuine friendship of your own has grown. I find it hard to look up to someone like Steven [and Jancis Robinson] and not see them as friends of my parents but I never get the sense from Steven that he ever looks at me as anything but a friend in my own right.”
The wine world has lost a giant, but one who touched many people (including myself) with his politeness, his generosity, his interest in new things in wine, and his example as a gentleman. His influence on Virginia wine as a new category of quality wine will be hard to measure.
Photo: Steven & Richard judging the 2020 VA Wine Governor’s Cup