Grape Guide
Petite Arvine
WhitePetite Arvine is the most distinguished native white grape of the Swiss Valais, planted almost entirely in that canton on steep, sunny, well-drained slopes. It gives taut, saline whites with grapefruit and rhubarb fruit, mostly dry but also botrytised and late-harvest sweet wines of considerable longevity.
Key characteristics
- Native to the Valais, with a first written record from Sion in 1602
- Early budding and late ripening, so it is exposed to spring frost and autumn rot
- Compact bunches that are prone to botrytis, downy mildew and mites
- Needs sunny, well-drained, calcareous slopes and fails on flat, damp ground
- Roughly 270 hectares in Switzerland, around 96 percent of them in the Valais
Typical flavors
Major regions
Valais (Switzerland) · Fully (Valais) · Chamoson (Valais) · Sion (Valais) · Valle d'Aosta (Italy) · Rhône Valley (France, authorized, minimal planting)
Also known as
Arvena · Arvina · Arvine · Petite Arvine (Valais)
Petite Arvine is the Valais's best-regarded indigenous white and the variety most often chosen to show what the canton's steep Rhône valley terraces can do. The wines combine real weight and a faintly creamy texture with piercing, well-integrated acidity. Grapefruit, rhubarb and passion fruit dominate in youth, together with a saline, almost briny finish that growers attribute to mineral-rich soils; floral and stony notes come forward with bottle age.
The grape is demanding in the vineyard and rarely produces cheap wine. It is sensitive to wind, spring frost and humidity, which keeps plantings to a few hundred hectares, concentrated on the best exposures. Most bottlings are dry, but the same berries, left to hang late, make some of Switzerland's most admired sweet wines, which keep for decades. A small outpost in Italy's Valle d'Aosta produces a closely related style, and the grape has legal standing in France though almost no vineyard area.
Petite Arvine originates in the Valais. Its first written mention dates to 1602 in Sion, where the vine went by the local name Arvena. The name may derive from the Latin arvena, "newcomer", suggesting a vine named for when it arrived or first showed up; this is conjecture. Nothing supports the popular notion that the Romans introduced it, and a supposed tie to Helvola, a variety Cato wrote about, was abandoned once Helvola turned out to be a black-berried vine.
The word "Petite" was added in the late nineteenth century so that growers could tell it apart from Grosse Arvine, a bigger-berried relative that has nearly disappeared. Genetic analysis shows Grosse Arvine descends from Rèze, an ancient Valais variety, and is a possible grandchild, niece or nephew of Petite Arvine. Petite Arvine has no known parents, which is why Swiss growers sometimes call it an orphan variety. It is not genetically related to Arvino Nero (Gaglioppo) or Alvino Verde (Verdeca) of southern Italy; the names alone look alike.
Acreage stayed modest through most of the twentieth century, at roughly 14 hectares in the 1970s and about 39 in 1990. Plantings have since grown to around 270 hectares. France permitted the variety in 2010, and in 2011 it entered the national catalogue, following the abandonment of a trial plot in the northern Rhône.
Petite Arvine buds very early and ripens late, so it needs a long, warm season and carries a real frost risk in spring. It is vigorous and productive, with compact bunches that hold their berries tightly. Wind can damage the shoots, and the variety is susceptible to downy mildew and mites. Tight bunches leave it prone to botrytis as harvest approaches, which is a hazard for dry wines but the very feature that sweet wine producers rely on. It does best on sunny, steep slopes with well-drained, calcareous or schistous soils, and performs poorly on flat or heavy, moist ground. Angelo Gaja's trial in the Langhe met severe coulure and broken shoots, and the variety has not become established there.
Dry Petite Arvine is the standard style: pale lemon-green, with grapefruit, rhubarb and passion fruit, a firm acid line, moderate to medium-plus body and a finish that often tastes salty. Fermentation is usually in stainless steel, with a minority aged on lees or in large oak to add breadth. Many growers pick in stages so that some fruit reaches higher ripeness, giving a fuller, rounder wine without losing tension. Sweet versions are a regional specialty: late-harvest and botrytised wines are made, some of them under the Grain Noble ConfidenCiel quality charter shared by a group of Valais producers, and they show candied citrus, apricot and honey that are kept in balance by the same acidity. Dry examples drink well young, but the best age for ten years or more, taking on honeyed, stony and floral notes. Serving at 10 to 12 degrees Celsius is typical.
Where it grows
Valais
Home of the grape, with about 96 percent of Swiss plantings. Vineyards on the steep slopes of the Rhône valley give wines with ripe citrus and a saline finish.
Fully and Chamoson
Villages in the central Valais that are widely cited for the most characterful Petite Arvine, from sunny slopes with well-drained soils.
Valle d'Aosta
A handful of hectares in north-west Italy, where producers such as Grosjean Frères and Les Crêtes make varietal wines. The wines are similar in structure to the Swiss examples, with acidity and a mineral edge.
Langhe
Angelo Gaja trialled the variety in Piedmont but met serious coulure and broken shoots, and it has not become established there.
France
Authorized in 2010 and catalogued in 2011. Michel Chapoutier had earlier run an experimental plot in the northern Rhône, which was later abandoned; commercial plantings remain negligible.