98pts James Suckling

Extremely subtle and delicate, this has an enveloping nose of tiny red berries and dried flowers. This sparkling rosé masterpiece is just beginning to really open up. Fabulous velvety texture on the mouth-filling palate, the very fine mousse already spot on. Tons of structure behind all this, so this should age really well. From organically grown grapes. Tasted at the Cristal vertical tasting at the champagne house on July 6th, 2023. Drink from release.

98pts Wine & Spirits

Jean-Baptiste Lécaillon describes the spring of 2014 as sunny and dry, leading up to a heat wave in June. Then a cool, wet summer ended with the return of the dry, sunny heat in September. When our panel tasted the Cristal 2014 last year, I found it confusing, but the Cristal 2014 Rosé is a different beast. With its pale pink color and tight saignée essence of fruit, it's both saturated and lithe; the wine's freshness feels like the sky opening from a summer rain into the sun. Its flavor depths of golden raspberry, barely-pink grapefruit, roasted autumn apple and toasty pumpkin seed hide a dark rosé within the complex flavors of a pale yet intricately detailed white wine. As a young vintage, it yields to the touch, like a tightening muscle, needing a decade or more of cellar time to begin to give itself more completely.

97pts Jeb Dunnuck

The 2014 Champagne Cristal Rosé is much more open and generous, with brothy and briny elements like an ocean breeze. Coming from two plots of Chardonnay and two plots of Pinot Noir, it has a very natural and ripe, floral perfume of peach and peony. On the palate, there’s an energy and electricity to this wine that could be called the golden point of high-toned energy. With wonderful persistence and a delicate spice as well as notes of peachy fruit, oyster shell, and brine, it’s long on the finish and refined throughout. There’s a light spice to the mousse that accents things well and a cologne of more woodsy spice that draws inward. The finish has a bit of mouthwatering tension and coiled energy that’s going to take time to unfurl, so hold this another few years and drink it over the following 30.

97pts Wine Enthusiast - Cellar Selection

The epitome of great rosé Champagne, this is beautifully intense. The fruit and balanced mineral edge are united with mature redcurrant flavors in a wine that is perfectly aged. It is an impressive wine that is ready to drink.

97pts Robert Parker's Wine Advocate

Roederer's 2014 Cristal Rosé has turned out beautifully, unwinding in the glass with aromas of sweet cherries, almonds, citrus fruit and red berries mingled with notions of white flowers and wet chalk. Full-bodied, fleshy and enveloping, with a layered core of fruit and a pillowy mousse, it's deep, racy and electric, concluding with a long, mineral finish. Comparatively open out of the gates, it's no slight to the 2014's seriousness to say that it will drink well while its 2013 counterpart sleeps in the cellar. Deriving from just a handful of the over 39 blocks that inform the regular Cristal 2014, I suspect that its origins have even more to do with the extra dimension it possesses above and beyond its white counterpart than the subtle infusion of Pinot Noir phenolics that give it its delicate pink hue.

97pts Vinous

The 2014 Cristal Rosé sizzles with energy. Finely cut and crystalline to the core, the 2014 is laced with striking vibrancy. Chalk, mint, white flowers, cranberry and blood orange all race across the palate. Deceptively understated and nuanced, the 2014 possesses tons of energy and captivating inner perfume. The 2014 is at the beginning of what is sure to be a very long life. I would not plan on opening a bottle for at least a few years. The style of the vintage is one built on linear intensity more than opulence, like say 2004, with captivating aromatics and a sort of inner tension that needs to resolve. As always, the Rosé is done in the classic Roederer infusion style in which Pinot Noir is vinified on the skins and then blended with Chardonnay to complete the fermentation. Dosage is 7 grams per liter. Disgorged: June 2022. Cristal Rosé is a much smaller production made from just three parcels. Here, the preference is for riper Pinot from the Bonnotte-Pierre-Robert lieu-dit in Aÿ, macerated for about a week and then infused into Chardonnays from Montmartin in Mesnil-sur-Oger and Pierre Vaudon in Avize. Naturally, this approach requires parcels that ripen in a very specific sequence. Here, too, there is no malolactic fermentation. Oak is about 15% for the Rosé, lower than the Blanc.

96pts Wine Spectator

Features rich, focused flavors of peach tart, poached apricot and mandarin orange fruit, plus accents of toasted brioche, pastry cream, pickled ginger and pink grapefruit sorbet. Exudes an overall vibrant impression, with a fine interplay of elegance and complexity, showing deft integration of the vivid acidity and the satiny mousse. Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. Drink now through 2038.

Tasting Notes

Pink hue with slightly coppery tints. Dynamic bubbles forming a lingering bead. Pure, precise and dazzling bouquet. The intense Pinot noir aromas take us back to the harvest time with its pure, ripe and concentrated fruit: zesty red berries (red currants, wild raspberries, blackcurrants) and raspberry liqueur. Then come sweet spice and smoky notes with a hint of reduction (smoky, spicy) from the Pinot noir with its notes of undergrowth. Concentrated and broad on the palate, where the red fruit (strawberries, raspberries) is concentrated into a firm, dense texture that reveals itself in two stages that reflect the year's extremes: Initially the texture is silky and broad on entry (the final ripeness) and then followed by a firm and intense freshness (the cool summer). We have a sensation of concentration, of a whirlwind of flavors that burst delicately and gradually like salt bubbles on the palate. The saline, iodine impression combines with the smoky notes and acidity to create umami and an infinitely flavorsome finish.

About the Wine

The aromatic expression of Cristal Rosé was already wonderfully enhanced by the infusion technique used since its creation, but we wanted to go further by separating the two phases of infusion and fermentation with even greater precision. Jean-Baptiste Lécaillon, our cellar and vineyard manager since 1999, has continued to perfect the technique, inspired by the work of the great Japanese tea masters who have mastered the art of preparing and infusing tea leaves to extract even fresher, cleaner and brighter flavours. For almost 25 years, this continuous process of reflection has guaranteed even greater purity in the infusion.

Cristal Champagne is called “Cristal” because it was originally created in 1876 for Tsar Alexander II of Russia, who requested a luxury champagne bottled in clear lead-crystal glass rather than the usual dark bottles so he could see the wine and ensure no hidden explosives. The transparent, flat-bottomed bottle (another safety feature) became the wine’s defining look, and the French word cristal (“crystal”) remained as the name to reflect both the material and the cuvée’s elite origins.

Winery Notes

In 1845, Louis Roederer acquired 15 hectares in the Grand Cru vineyards of Verzenay. The idea—which was quite unusual at a time when grapes had little value—was to become a wine grower in order to master the entire process of creating his vintage wines. Ever since, every Louis Roederer vintage originates exclusively from our own vines, which is rare indeed in the Champagne region. The quest for a diversity of terroirs, crus, parcels, and grape varieties in the vineyards (or climats to use the Burgundian expression) was rapidly integrated by the House of Louis Roederer. A groundbreaking strategy was implemented, which involved buying specific parcels selected for their capacity to produce distinctive wines. This strategy is still a core component of the House’s continuing development.

In 2024, Louis Roederer’s vineyards stretched across 250 hectares and include 420 parcels.

Blend: 55% Pinot Noir, 45% Chardonnay

*Gift Box can be included