The Kaleidoscope Above Sion: Oscar Hauser & Thomas Carl
In Savièse, on the south-facing terraces above the Rhône valley beyond Sion, Oscar Hauser and Thomas Carl have built one of Switzerland's tiniest natural wine estates: one hectare of steep, hand-worked vines, spontaneous and unfiltered wines, a single sulphur addition at bottling — and every bottle carrying its own hand-painted label. Founded 2024; wines AOC Valais.
Cave Kaléidoscope is the work of two friends, Oscar Hauser and Thomas Carl, who took over a winery premises and one hectare of vines near Granois, a village at 900m altitude on the heights of Savièse, above Sion in the central Valais. The company behind the cave is Carl Hauser Sàrl; the wines are AOC Valais, made in one of Switzerland's driest and sunniest wine regions.
From the start, the pair made the ecosystem the project. Since taking over they have used no herbicides, and the native flora has come back on its own — sainfoin and cranesbill standing hip-high between the rows, green lizards among old vine wood, a praying mantis climbing over a freshly picked bunch. The bottle states it in one sentence: «Respect de l'écosystème des vignes.» The cave is in conversion to organic farming — not yet certified, but underway.
The Place — Terraces Above the Rhône
Savièse lies on the south-facing slope above the Rhône valley, up beyond Sion, and the parcels climb steep terraces — rocky, well-drained slopes where no machine reaches and every row is worked by hand. Valais is the driest wine region in Switzerland: endless sun, little rain, and cool nights rolling down from the side valleys — the reason a Fendant can stop at 11.1% alcohol here and still taste ripe, holding its acidity while the sugar never runs away.
The One Hectare
Chasselas, Pinot Noir, Gamay, Pinot Gris, Sylvaner, Diolinoir and Humagne — the indigenous palette of the Valais, plus Merlot and Viognier, on slopes some of whose gnarled old trunks are considerably older than the two winemakers themselves.
Cover Crop, Not Herbicide
The grass and wildflowers stay between the rows, mown rather than turned over. Treatments are still conventional copper-sulphur while the conversion to organic proceeds — with disease-resistant varieties planned for the coming years.
Tiny by Design
A good thousand bottles of the 2024 Fendant, and just 150 each of the Pinot Noir and the Merlot. One hectare means every vintage is a small edition — and every bottle is numbered by its painted label.
What's Coming
For 2025: an orange-fermented Fendant, a Viognier, an orange blend of Pinot Gris, Johannisberg and Viognier, and a Syrah — the rest of the 2025s resting in barrel, in stainless and in fiberglass.
Winemaking — Nothing Added, Nothing Taken Away
The cellar method is disciplined subtraction. All wines ferment spontaneously on native yeasts — no starter cultures, no heating or cooling, no clarification, no filtration. The Fendant goes into tank as whole bunches in their own juice; the Pinot Noir and Merlot spend three weeks on the skins, part whole-cluster, part destemmed.
Then there is what does not happen. No oenological additives, and sulphur goes in once — only at bottling. Total sulphites stay below 30 mg/L in the Fendant and below 25 in the two reds: a fraction of what the regulations permit, and for future vintages the pair have said the number is zero. In 2024 everything was made in fiberglass tanks; in 2025 stainless steel and barrels join. Bottling is done by hand, siphon filler and lever corker.
What makes the range unmistakable is the label — literally. Every bottle carries its own painted picture, and on the back there is a small scene instead of a tasting note. The Fendant's reads: «After a hard day in cold and wind, your survival instinct leads you to the fridge.» The wine and the artwork are made by the same four hands.
The Wines — The 2024 First Vintage
Three wines from the one hectare, all from the debut 2024 vintage: spontaneous, unfiltered, sulphured once at bottling. Think Valais classics — Fendant and Pinot Noir — remade with almost nothing added. Quantities are tiny; when a vintage is gone, it is gone.
Fendant 2024
The debut white — Chasselas, whole-bunch pressed, alpine-freshChasselas under its Valais name, fermented as whole bunches in its own juice, unfiltered at 11.1% alcohol. Ripe yet linear — the cool Alpine nights holding the acidity while the sun does the ripening. Around 1,000 bottles; CHF 19.50.
Pinot Noir 2024
The mountain red — three weeks on skins, part whole-bunchValais Pinot Noir, spontaneous and unfiltered, macerated three weeks with a share of whole clusters. Featherweight, aromatic and alive — just 150 bottles made. CHF 23.
Merlot 2024
The outlier — Merlot on the high terraces of SavièseMerlot, ripened slow on south-facing terraces and bottled unfiltered with a single sulphur addition. Juicy and mineral rather than plush — the Alpine version of a grape the Valais adopted long ago. 150 bottles; CHF 24.50.
The 2025 Pipeline
Orange Fendant, Viognier, an orange Pinot Gris blend & a SyrahFor 2025: an orange-fermented Fendant, a Viognier, an orange blend of Pinot Gris, Johannisberg and Viognier, and a Syrah — the rest of the vintage already resting in barrel. The pattern keeps turning.
Legacy — How Little It Takes to Begin
The Cave Kaléidoscope story is proof that an estate can start small and stay honest. No inheritance, no grand domaine — two friends, one hectare of terraces nobody machines could reach, and a cellar taken over in Granois in 2024. In a canton where wine is usually a patrimony, they built a cave from a premises, a siphon filler and a lever corker, and made the smallness part of the point.
The second legacy is patience as method. The 2024s were the first vintage, made entirely in fiberglass while the conversion to organic proceeds and resistant varieties wait to be planted. The plan is long: copper and sulphur for now, certification underway, zero added sulphur in future vintages — a trajectory written into the wines one vintage at a time.
And the legacy is a new visual language for Valais wine. Every bottle carries a painting, and every back label carries a scene instead of a tasting note — wine as artwork, artwork as label. Tradition and transition in the same rack: the oldest grapes of the Rhône terraces, bottled by the newest cave above Sion, each one a different pattern with every turn.