Which Champagne producer is credited with introducing the first wire cage for sparkling-wine corks?

Adolphe Jacquesson is credited with introducing the wire cage used to secure sparkling-wine corks.

The wire cage is called a muselet in French. It holds the cork in place against the pressure inside a bottle, working together with the cork’s mushroom shape and the bottle’s strong glass. Before such restraints became standard, sparkling-wine bottles were more difficult and dangerous to store and transport because corks could be forced out unexpectedly.

Jacquesson was a Champagne house founded in 1798 by Memmie Jacquesson. Adolphe Jacquesson later developed several practical improvements for Champagne production and packaging. Historical accounts commonly associate him with the wire muzzle or cage patented in the nineteenth century.

The familiar four-loop wire pattern is not the same thing as the foil capsule around the cork. The foil is decorative and protective; the muselet supplies the essential mechanical restraint. Bottles are usually opened with the cage loosened but left in place.