#485 Christian Audigier Wines

I simply don't understand the whole 'fashion label' thing.  To me, a black T-Shirt is a black T-Shirt.  I appreciate that there are different fabrics to take into consideration, but having one label on it rather than another and charging double just seems pretty daft to me.  I do understand quality, which is why my shirts come from Jermyn Street, just from the more affordable producers rather than Turnbull & Asser, but, to me at least, a lot of products with designer labels on them are of no greater or lesser quality than a much cheaper alternative.  I don't 'get' fashion, and am the first to admit it.  It is why I don't write a clothes blog and had never heard of Christian Audigier until this week.

As has become the norm when you don't know of someone, I Googled him and found that Monsieur Audigier appears to have done rather well for himself.  Moving to America in 2000 with $500 in his pocket, this fashion designer quickly got a celebrity clientele, and worked for companies including Von Dutch and Levi and, in little over a decade, has built up a $250million per year business.  He obviously knows what he is doing in fashion, and has decided to venture into wine, and I was given three of these to try.

The first thing I noticed was that the bottles said "Established 1958", the year of Christian Audigier's birth.  Using your name as a brand is one thing, but using your date of birth as the founding date of your company is just a bit, well, pretentious.  Then there are the labels.  As a picture paints a thousand words, here they are:

Conventional these bottles are not, but I think that is a good thing.  I grant you that your Granny may not like them, unless she happens to be into Death Metal, but by covering them in bright colours, skulls and eagles it is a sure fire way to get noticed on a shelf.  They do reflect the design of Christian Audigier's clothes so, from a business perspective, he has successfully transferred his brand into another category.  According to the importer, these are opening up wine to a new category of potential drinkers, most specifically, the Tattoo and Body Art community, which appears to be huge!  Again, another good thing that these wines are doing.

Having said all that, these are still wine, and in the wine world, the demands for quality are just as high as the demand for a good tattoo artist in a bikers convention.  So I cracked open the seals and tried them.


2010 Christian Audigier Sauvignon Blanc

Summery hedgerow flowers, but a lot of sweet citrus on the nose which is a bit strange.  The palate is soft, very subtle with some slight grassy flavours, green bananas and a very underripe lemon pith and a long, boring finish.  It really doesn't taste like Sauvignon Blanc should.  65pts


2009 Christian Audigier Syrah

Fruit toffee on the nose, very very sweet with a bit of bramble and vanilla ice cream.  There is an alcoholic, menthol element coming out as well.  The palate starts badly with a disjointed mess of underripe blueberries, liquorice and tar and then lightens in flavour but not weight to produce a fat, insipid finish.  This is an ugly wine. 55pts


2008 Christian Audigier Cabernet Sauvignon

Rich sweet stewed cherry coming off the nose.  There is then a cheap chocolate aroma coming off the nose that isn't that nice mixed with more of the toffee. The palate has Cabernet characteristics, but they are terrible Cabernet characteristics.  Violent vegetal elements mixed with a bit of liquorice and bitter berry fruit.  Awful.  57pts

I'm not fussed that the wine has skulls on the label, nor am I bothered by the fact that they are a 'celebrity wine', as there are some good examples of these.  Trying these wines, I feel that at ten pounds less than the sixteen you would pay for them, you would still be being ripped off.  They are badly made wines, only one of which tastes like it should and none of them have any redeeming characters.  I love the concept of these wines, and the fact that Monsieur Audigier named one of his children 'Mick Jagger', but he should stick to clothes as he is obviously very good at that.  Leave the wine to people who know what they are doing.