This baroque-style slate bell tower tops the Hautvillers Intercommunal Tourist Office. A few kilometres from Epernay, Hautvillers overlooks the loops of the Marne. The village is surrounded by the Champagne vineyards to the south and east. It is home to the Saint-Pierre’s Benedictine Abbey, steeped in history. It was there in the late 17th century that the monk Dom Pierre Pérignon discovered the method of wine ‘champagnisation’. Numerous wrought iron signs (about 140) decorate the facades of many houses in the village, just like in the Middle Ages.