Ariel started the venture in 2005, but 2010 (100% Malbec) was the first vintage, and since then only three other vintages have been released—2013, 2014, and 2015 (2017 will be next)—a result of the decision to produce the wine only in suitably fine years. The production is tiny; there were only 880 magnums of the 2010, 5,300 bottles and a few magnums of the 2015, and only half as much of the 2017. The 2015, a blend of 85% Malbec and 15% Cabernet Franc, matured in 50% new oak, is a very lovely wine: expressive but subtle in its elegant fragrance, as much floral and herbal as fruity or spicy, with a faint whiff of incense, becoming a little more leathery and savory with air; then on the palate, effortlessly intense and seamless, fresh, flowing, graceful, silky, and supple, with the gentlest grip on the lingering finish. A rara avis, but well worth catching if ever you spot it. Other high-end producers who have recently staged wine dinners on Velaa include Hervé Berland, chief executive of Château Montrose (in January 2023), and more are planned, so anybody in the happy position of being able to attend should keep a careful eye on the program there via the Velaa website. Michelin-starred chefs from around the world also make special guest appearances, working alongside the talented home team.


Luxury and sustainability The idea of flying thousands of miles, at least the last hundred in a private plane where there may be as many crew as passengers, to indulge in a dazzling array of luxurious food and wine, all of


Above: One of the beach residences and 17 of the water pool villas out on the lagoon, the accommodation housing a maximum of some 130 guests.


which also has to be flown or shipped in, will give any responsible traveler pause for thought. But environmental responsibility and sustainability come in several forms. Ahu recalled that the coconut (kurum’baa) that was merely an exotic embellishment to one of our lunches had been, as recently as the years after World War II, almost the only source of nourishment for his parents and others of their generation on neighboring islands, its milk injected into those suffering from dysentery. Over the past ten years, Velaa has offered many young Maldivians far more opportunities for education and employment than it did as a farm for chilies and rice, though an old stone building, now a small museum, has been preserved as a memorial of that way of life and those times. (Jiří Šmejc is also the active chairman of Sirius Foundation, the charity he created to help underprivileged young people more widely.) The hundreds of staff on Velaa are housed in the center of the island but are allowed to have family members on other islands visit them and to make home visits in return. Even the fine-dining offerings on the island are increasingly sustainable, using more and more local, seasonal ingredients. A dedicated team of marine biologists based on the island is working on the most ambitious coral-restoration program in the Maldives, to help protect the ecosytem in the surrounding seas, and guests can adopt individual coral lines, receiving regular updates on their progress. The fragility of the Maldives, in the face of climate change and ever-rising sea levels, makes their allure all the more compelling —indeed, well-nigh irresistible, for those with the wherewithal— now, as long as it doesn’t hasten their disappearance. If all of them do eventually sink beneath the waves, Bacchus and Faunus will surely be begging Neptune to make Velaa their last huraa. 


THE WORLD OF FINE WINE | ISSUE 79 | 2023 | 159


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