History and Family
The soul of the House

Marcel Ployez and Yvonne Jacquemart

Marcel Ployez, who trained as an architect, was also a drawer by taste. Creative and ingenious, it was he who designed the House logo, creating the identity and visual soul still used today at Ployez-Jacquemart. He also runs the business. After 27 years at the head of the Champagne House, Marcel Ployez died in 1957. As for Yvonne, she is the driving force behind the creation of the wines, shaping the Ployez-Jacquemart ranges.

In those troubled times, the creation of the Ployez-Jacquemart Champagne House was a huge gamble. But the couple led a life of passion for their estate and their wines, and were thus able to lay the first stones and the stable edifice of the business, to enable subsequent generations to continue their work and pursuit of excellence.

Gérard Ployez and Claude Ployez

After the death of Marcel Ployez, his son Gérard Ployez took up the family business with an iron fist and a very assertive personality, alongside his mother Yvonne Jacquemart, who continued to shape the Ployez-Jacquemart ranges until her death in 1967.

Gérard Ployez brings an essential professional touch to the House. A graduate in oenology from the Ecole de Beaune in 1947, he possessed immense knowledge and was full of enthusiasm. He bought land, started working with small barrels and, above all, experimented a great deal. In the 1960s, Gérard took charge of both the vinification and the marketing of his champagnes, and the estate grew to between 11 and 12 hectares. In 1962, the Ployez family celebrated Gérard’s marriage to Claude. Together they continued the adventure of Champagne Ployez-Jacquemart.

1976 was a year of change. In the aftermath of a major global economic and financial crisis, coupled with costly inheritance expenses following the death of his mother, Gérard Ployez was forced to sell off part of his vineyard, retaining 3 hectares as property. Gérard Ployez was determined to follow in his parents’ footsteps with dignity, helped by his wife Claude, who took on the administrative and commercial management of the estate and developed wine tourism. The couple began passing on their know-how to their children.

The 1980s saw the start of export sales, which brought a breath of fresh air to the House, with a new foreign clientele of connoisseurs brought in by Laurence Ployez. Domaine Ployez-Jacquemart finally found the personalities who recognised the expertise and quality of its wines.

Laurence Ployez 
& Christophe Prieux

For more than 90 years, the family’s descendants have consolidated the founding values of the House, centred on traditional, ancestral know-how and French-style refinement and elegance. This work, begun by the Ployez-Jacquemart couple in 1930, continued from 1950 to 2000 thanks to the work of Gérard and his wife Claude, and since 1988 with Laurence Ployez, the granddaughter of the founders, who has become the current Cellar Master. These three generations have succeeded in perpetuating the “artisanal” spirit of Maison Ployez-Jacquemart.

Laurence Ployez was born in 1963, the eldest daughter of Gérard and Claude. She is the current Wine Maker at Champagne Ployez-Jacquemart and the guardian of a unique expertise in Champagne. Trained since 1988 by her father, Gérard Ployez, she rigorously oversees the vinification and commercialisation of Ployez-Jacquemart champagnes, while bringing her own unique sensibility to the process.

Laurence studied Applied Biology in the field of Agronomy, then looked for her career elsewhere before returning to the estate. Her first passion was the gastronomic professions, and she began her career working in the restaurant sector in renowned gastronomic establishments. Among other places, she went to Vancouver in Canada to learn to speak English fluently, and returned to the property in September 1988 for the grape harvest, where she continued her training in the winery. She began an apprenticeship alongside her father, who taught a rigorous “transmission of knowledge”.

Since the 2000s, the House has been at its peak: export sales have increased, and the winemaking method and positioning of the House have become more solid. Unfortunately, Gérard Ployez passed away in 2002. After her mother’s retirement, Laurence Ployez continued her work as oenologist and director of Domaine Ployez-Jacquemart alongside Christophe Prieux, with who the collaboration began in 2004.