96 points - “Planted in 1922 on red clay loams over shale and ironstone. Darker fruit profile, but without density. Assured, poised and intricately structured. Dark cherry, rubbed rosemary, a seam of spice. It’s a beautiful framework, with the temptation to over-decorate through winemaking resisted.” - Nick Ryan (The Australian)

95 points - “This was fermented, beginning as whole berries, then plunged over about 10 days and mostly matured in tank. The expressiveness of site and vintage is evident even at this early-bottled stage, if perhaps a tad shy presently. This is the palest and prettiest of the single-vineyard trio, with wild raspberry, redcurrant, sour cherry, cranberry, a hint of rose and dried orange peel, the feel engagingly savoury and refined, cinched by fine, skinsy tannins, chewy, sandy and pithy. This expands beautifully with air and promises to be singing on release.” - Marcus Ellis (Halliday Wine Companion)

95 points - “1922 plantings here. Blackberry, red fruit, some liquorice, exotic spice, Earl Grey tea, dried rose, smells a bit stony too. Medium-bodied, dark red berries, dense tight tannin, quite stony and ‘minerally’ in feel, juicy orange and cranberry acidity, ferrous and long to finish. Very good. Expressive and kind of fine-boned in a way, and comes over more than a little like Nebbiolo. Give it a year or two more in bottle, I’d say.” - Gary Walsh (The Wine Front)

TASTING NOTE

Savoury aromatics bay leaves, rocket and peppery spice rose petal and fragrant mint are complimented with cranberry and cherry fruit.

On the palate the wine shows savoury cherries and bright red berries along with mixed herbs a freshness of acidity and wet slate, minerally tannins.

VINTAGE

Weather conditions during spring were wet and windy which had an impact on flowering and resulted in small crops. Cool and wet conditions continued into early summer, but thankfully the rain stopped around Christmas time to allow the fruit to start to ripen and to keep the disease at bay. Harvest started much later than average due to the cooler conditions. Whilst we had to pick some of the reds around rain events they mostly ripened well with fresh and vibrant fruit flavours.

The 23 vintage wines are showing elegance and finesse, with fresh fruit flavours, fine tannins and good acidity.

VINEYARD

A single vineyard Grenache sourced from Bernard Smart’s vineyard in Clarendon, McLaren Vale. The dry grown bush vines were planted in 1922 on loamy soils over red-brown clay and bedrock. Vineyard is situated at 230m above sea level on a South-East facing slope.

WINEMAKING

Fruit was hand harvested, destemmed and whole berry sorted into stainless steel open fermenters. The whole berry ferment spent 9 days on skins, during which time it was gently plunged to ensure optimum extraction whilst maintaining the delicate aromatics. Wine was basket pressed off skins before maturation and malolactic fermentation on lees majority in stainless steel to retain fruit purity and freshness.