CSWWC 2022: All the World, National, Regional and medal winners revealed!

The cream of sparkling wine and Champagne talent was able to come together for the CSWWC 2022 awards ceremony in London.

The medal winners of the Champagne & Sparkling Wine World Championships were announced on Friday 16th September with a total of 147 Gold & 249 Silver medals awarded in this year’s competition. The award ceremony and The Best in Class and Trophy winners were revealed at this year’s CSWWC Awards Dinner on the 3rd November in London. 

This year saw close to 1000 sparkling wines judged over 11 days from 21 different countries with Australia, France and Italy submitting their most entries since the competition began.

Italy once again took the top of the leaderboard for the most medals triumphing with 53 Gold and 129 Silver medals, but France took home the most Gold medals this year with 55 Golds and 48 Silver medals.

For the first time we saw Australia take third place on the medal leaderboard, Followed by the UK, USA and Spain.

While France and Italy continue to dominate in terms of the number of their entries, the diversity of entries the Champagne & Sparkling Wine World Championships receives from countries and regions around the world is second to none. This year the competition received entries for the first time, from Belgium, and saw Domaine Du Chant D’Eole straight out the starting blocks winning a silver medal for their Domaine du 2019 Brut Rosé.

Judge Essi Avellan MW commented “We were thrilled with the quality of the whole range of wines that we tasted this year. What’s terrific is that the medal wins come from both the largest producers and some of the smallest, and from long established to newcomers. Huge congratulations to all the medal winners!”

This year the Sparkling Wine Producer of the Year Trophy goes to Ferrari. This award is not by any arbitrary system but strictly according to the highest number of Gold medals won, Ferrari championed with 11 Gold medals! However, it was great to see, for the first time, a few contenders snapping at their heels for this award – look out 20223!

Tom Stevenson, Founder and Chairman of the CSWWC, commented “This has been another great year for results, once again demonstrating how exciting the sparkling wine industry is. It is not only our mission to promote world class wines, but also to discover and reward new and exciting wines from established and emerging regions across the world. Finding exciting quality from unexpected places around the world is one of the reasons why the CSWWC exists, whether that quality is from emerging sparkling wine countries like Belgium, Spain, Bulgaria or Romania or unexpected parts of classic sparkling wine countries, such as Italy, where Sicily continues to baffle us with extraordinary performance. Another is keeping track of all the established greats, seeing if they continue to come through the totally blind process with Golds, Best in Class and then on to Trophies.”

Although the CSWWC does not award medals lower than Silver, the judges take a keen interest in theoretical Bronze winners. With a Bronze from a classic sparkling wine appellation, it is easy for producers to submit a magnum the next year and almost guarantee a Silver or even a Gold because the difference in quality between a regular 75cl bottle and a magnum of effectively the same wine is truly that great. However, when a Bronze is from a relatively obscure, unknown or untested region, they have virtually no local expertise to assist them, so it is important for those producers to understand that they could be on the verge of achieving a world class sparkling wine. There were 447 theoretical Bronze medal wines this year that can and should give them hope for the future.

During the ceremony  Tom Stevenson, the awards founders and head of judging, praised each and every one for the effort, dedication and sheer brilliance that each have contributed to the history, development and success of the sparkling wine world as it is today.

He said: “I was absolutely delighted to be back hosting the awards ceremony in person. This has been another great year for results, once again demonstrating how exciting the sparkling wine industry is. It is not only our mission to promote world class wines, but also to discover and reward new and exciting wines from established and emerging regions across the world. Exciting quality finds like sparkling wines from Bulgaria, Romania, and Alto Adige region in Italy to name a few, is one of the reasons why the CSWWC exists. Another is keeping track of all the established Greats, seeing if they continue to come through the totally blind process with Golds, Best in Class and then on to Trophies.”

This year, Carastelec Winery has confirmed the quality of the sparkling wines it produces. This year he took the prize for Best Romanian Sparkling Wine: Carassia Rosé in Magnum. 

Essi Avellan MW , one member of the jury, of CSWWC, discovered and tasted Romanian sparkling wines for the first time at the WineUp Fair in Transylvania 2017during the annual WineUp Official Selection judging. In 2017 the jury of WineUp awarded the Carrasia Blanc de Blanc, Best in Show award and a gold medal. Essi Avellan MW encouraged Carastelec winery to enter the CSWWC competition, and since then it has received awards every year, being considered the winery with the most spectacular qualitative evolution.

The full World Champions by Style and National Champions for 2022 are:

Supreme World Champion: Dom Ruinart 2010 Blanc de Blancs

World Champion Classic Brut NV Blend: Louis Roederer NV Collection 242 in Magnum

World Champion Classic Brut Vintage Blend: Gusbourne 2018 Brut Reserve

World Champion Classic Blanc de Blancs: Palmer & Co NV Blanc de Blancs in Magnum

World Champion Classic Blanc de Noirs: Palmer & Co NV Blanc de Blancs in Magnum

World Champion Classic Rosé: Henriot NV Rosé in Magnum

World Champion Library Vintage: House of Arras 2001 Museum Release Blanc de Blanc

World Champion Sparkling Red Wine: Cleto Chiarli 2021 Vecchia Modena Premium in Magnum

World Champion Sparkling Aromatic Wine: Cuvage NV Acquesi Asti

The Chairman’s Trophy: Bernard Loclas NV Grand Brut Blanc de Blanc

Sparkling Wine Producer of the Year: Ferrari Trentendoc

The Tony Jordan Rising Star Trophy: Kettmeir

Lifetime Achievement Award: Michel Davesne of Champagne Duetz

Lifetime Achievement Award: Alan Pailley of Domaine Alexandre Bonnet

Lifetime Achievement Award: Michel Drapper of Champagne Drappier

National Champions 2022

Best Australian Sparkling Wine: Swift 2011 Blanc de Blancs

Best Bulgarian Sparkling Wine: Midalidare Estate NV Sparkling Wine Gold in Magnum

Best English Sparkling Wine: Simpsons Wine Estate 2018 Flint Fields Blanc de Noirs

Best French Sparkling Wine: Dom Ruinart 2010 Blanc de Blancs

Best Hungarian Sparkling Wine: Sauska NV Brut in Magnum

Best Italian Sparkling Wine: Kettmeir 2018 Athesis Brut in Magnum

Best Romanian Sparkling Wine: Carassia Rosé in Magnum

Best New Zealand Sparkling Wine: No 1 Family Estate NV Rosé

Best Spanish Sparkling Wine: Freixenet NV Cordon Negro Brut in Magnum

Best US Sparkling Wine: Caraccioli 2016 Blanc de Blancs

Regional Champions

Best Non-Deluxe Champagne: Louis Roederer NV Collection 242 in Magnum

Best Deluxe Champagne Best Champagne: Dom Ruinart 2010 Blanc de Blancs

Best Alto Adige: Kettmeir 2018 Atheisi Brut in Magnum

Best Asti: Cuvage NV Acquesi Asti

Best Franciacorta: Fratelli Berlucchi NV Brut 25 in Magnum

Best Lambrusco: Cleto Chiarli 2021 Vecchia Modena Premium in Magnum

Best Prosecco: Mionetto NV Extra Dry

Best Sicilian: G. Milazzo 2003 Federico II in Magnum

Best Trentodoc: Ferrari Trento 2013 Ferrari Perle Nero Riserva in Magnum

Best Cava: Freixenet NV Cordon Negro Brut in Magnum

Best Corpinnat: Llopart 2017 Panoramic Imperial

Best Californian: Caracciolo 2016 Blanc de Blancs

CSWWC 2022 Judges 

Tom Stevenson

Essi Avellan MW

Gyorgy Markus

Simon Stockton – Reserve judge