A.R. Lenoble is based in Damery in the Marne valley, a few kilometres from Épernay. The house was founded in 1920 by Armand-Raphaël Graser, a wine merchant from Alsace who had moved to Champagne in 1915. He chose the brand name with care: "AR" stands for his initials, and "Lenoble" is a bow to the nobility of champagne wines. After the First World War he did not want a German-sounding family name on the label. The original house dating from 1772 remains the company headquarters to this day.
The style is precise, fresh and usually low in dosage. According to the house, the cuvées carry no more than 3 grams of sugar per litre. The 18 hectares of its own vines are spread across three villages: Chardonnay from Chouilly (grand cru), Pinot Noir from Bisseuil (premier cru) and Pinot Meunier from Damery. Since 2012 the vineyards have held HVE environmental certification. One particular feature is the reserve wines: since 2010 part of them has been kept in magnums under natural cork. The number after "Mag" gives the base year of the blend, as in the Intense "Mag 18".
The best-known wines include the Intense, the grand cru blanc de blancs from Chouilly, the rosé from Chouilly and Bisseuil, and the blanc de noirs from Bisseuil. Then come the prestige cuvées Gentilhomme and Les Aventures. For a long time the house was run by Anne and Antoine Malassagne, great-grandchildren of the founder, from 1993 to 2023. According to French sources, the Frère-Gallienne family took a majority stake in 2023.
