Didier Dagueneau (1956[1] – 17 September 2008[2]) was a winemaker in the Loire Valley who received a cult following for his Sauvignon Blanc wines from the Pouilly Fumé appellation. He died on 17 September 2008, in an ultralight plane crash in the Cognac region of France.[3] He is survived by two children with his ex-wife Martine, Benjamin and Charlotte, who work at the domaine, and two children with his partner Suzan Cremer, Aaron and Léon.[4]
Dagueneau was born in 1956 in Saint-Andelain, Nièvre, Burgundy.[1] His winery with 12 hectares (30 acres) of vineyards[1] was in the town of Saint-Andelain, in Pouilly Fumé. He was seeking to make "the best Sauvignon blanc in the world".[2] He made a variety of different cuveés, including Buisson-Renard, Pur Sang (French for "pureblood"), Asteroïde, and Silex ("flint"). Somewhat unusually for the appellation and grape variety, many of his wines were meant for cellaring and some had a clear influence of oak. He was also developing vineyards in Jurançon.[4]
An ex-motorcycle racer with no formal enological training [5] Dagueneau clashed with other winegrowers about "typicité" ("typicity" or "showing its origin") while achieving unprecedented prices for the region.
His vineyard practices were a combination of the exacting (extremely low yields, hand harvesting in multiple passes[5]) with the unusual, such as using horses to plow the soil between vines.[6] He was described as a risk taker and an experimenter, with perfectionist attitudes to his work, cutting yields severely to achieve greater ripeness.[7]