A champagne cork, like all corks, initially has an elongated, cylindrical shape. The familiar mushroom shape with a conical base only develops later. The cork is inserted into the bottle neck under strong compression. Over time, the cork adapts to the bottle neck and loses its elasticity during storage. Only the lower part of the cork, which comes into contact with the champagne, retains its elasticity longer. Therefore, after opening the bottle, the lower part expands to its original diameter, while the upper part, due to its brittleness, retains the diameter of the bottle neck. However, the resilience of this mushroom shape diminishes the longer the cork remains in the bottle.
For the second fermentation phase (bottle fermentation), the champagne is first sealed with a crown or crown cork (bidule), a circular piece of sheet metal whose edge is bent into a crown shape and serves precisely to seal the beverage bottles airtight and neutral in taste. Only after disgorging and possibly adding the dosage, the champagne bottle is closed with the well-known corkstopper.
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