Wine Styles Explained: Beyond Red, White & Rosé
Wine comes in more styles than red, white, and rosé. Understanding the full spectrum — sparkling, fortified, skin-contact, and the rest — makes every wine list and every bottle shop more navigable.
· 7 min read
Key takeaways
- The primary wine styles are defined by their winemaking process, not by the grape or region. Understanding the process helps predict the style before you open the bottle.
- Sparkling wine is produced globally at every quality level. Champagne, Crémant, Prosecco, Cava, and Pétillant Naturel are all sparkling — but made by different methods with different results.
- Fortified wines (Port, Sherry, Madeira) have a spirit added, raising the alcohol and preserving residual sweetness. They are among the world's most age-worthy wines.
- Rosé is made from red grapes with brief skin contact — hours to days — rather than by blending red and white wine.
Frequently asked questions
- What is the difference between sparkling wine and Champagne?
- Champagne is a specific sparkling wine produced in the Champagne appellation in northeast France, made by the traditional method from Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, and Pinot Meunier. All Champagne is sparkling wine; not all sparkling wine is Champagne. Other traditional-method sparkling wines (Crémant, Cava, English sparkling wine) use the same method with different grapes and different terroirs — often at significantly lower prices.
- What is fortified wine?
- Fortified wine is wine to which grape spirit (usually brandy) has been added, raising the alcohol to 15–22% and — in most cases — preserving residual sweetness by halting fermentation. The main types: Port (sweet, from Portugal's Douro Valley), Sherry (ranging from bone-dry to intensely sweet, from Jerez, Spain), and Madeira (oxidatively aged, extraordinarily long-lived). Each is produced differently and suits different occasions.
- What is pétillant naturel (pét-nat)?
- Pétillant naturel is the oldest sparkling wine method — the wine is bottled before its initial fermentation is complete, producing gentle, low-pressure bubbles inside the bottle from the remaining yeast activity. The result is typically less fizzy than Champagne, often slightly hazy, and with a more rustic, yeasty character. It is the category of choice among natural wine producers and tends toward lower alcohol and fresher style than traditional-method sparkling wines.
- How is dessert wine made?
- Dessert wine can be made by several methods: late harvest (grapes left on the vine until sugar concentrates through dehydration or freeze), noble rot (botrytis cinerea fungus shrivels grapes and concentrates sugar while adding honeyed complexity — used in Sauternes and German TBA), or ice wine (grapes are harvested frozen, concentrating the sugar in the unfrozen juice). Each method produces different flavour profiles, but all result in wines of concentrated sweetness.
Not sure which wine to pick? Tell our sommelier what you are eating or the occasion and we will find the right bottle — or browse the full sommelia.ch collection.