Russian Eatery the Buyer of World’s Oldest Champagne
Rebecca Lynne Tan -Straits Times Indonesia | June 14, 2011

 Singapore. A Russian restaurant in Singapore is the mystery buyer behind the record-breaking purchase of a bottle of the world’s oldest champagne earlier this month.

Buyan Russian Haute Cuisine and Caviar Bar in Duxton Hill paid a world-record price of €30,000 ($49,145) for a bottle of 1841 Veuve Clicquot.

It also paid another €24,000 for a bottle of 19th-century Jugler - a champagne house now part of Jacquesson.

Buyan owner Julia Sherstyuk, 35, said in an exclusive interview with The Straits Times: ‘Our restaurant is not just about food; it is about wine and culture as well. It is about educating people, about history and about stories to tell the world. We are always on the lookout for various connections between Singapore and Russia.

‘So, when we discovered that these bottles were headed for the Russian court, of course we were interested.’

The two bottles were the first to be auctioned from a batch of 145 bottles salvaged last July from a 19th-century shipwreck in the waters south of Aaland, in the Finnish-controlled archipelago in the Baltic Sea. The shipwreck was 50m deep.

The restaurant outbid well-known champagne collector, American real estate entrepreneur Robert A. Rosania, for the two bottles at an auction held by premier wine auction house Acker Merrall & Condit in Mariehamn, Finland, on June 3.