2024 Wantirna Estate Isabella Chardonnay

97 pts
Well rounded, fine and fresh Chardonnay from the Yarra Valley. Only made in small quantities.

Price:
Sale price$112.00
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In stock, ready to ship
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Description

The Isabella Chardonnay comes from 50-60-year-old vines on an east-facing slope that catches soft morning and late afternoon sun - ideal for growing top-quality Chardonnay. The grapes are hand-picked, gently pressed, and fermented in French oak barrels before spending around eleven months on lees to build texture and complexity.

Production is always small here. The 2024 vintage gave 85 dozen bottles, a painfully small release, though it's up a little from the 2023 vintage.

It’s a fine, savoury style showing ripe lemon, white nectarine and a touch of fennel and oatmeal. Subtle cedar oak and fresh acidity keep it tight and balanced, with a long, citrus-led finish.

It’s ready to enjoy now, but it’ll hold and develop nicely for several years.

Gary Walsh

Gary Walsh

The Wine Front 94 Points

It’s a richer expression in 2024 offering plenty of Chardonnay flavour, though it’s still bright and focussed. I’m thinking white nectarine and yellow peach, grapefruit, a little lemon zest and aniseed, almond meal, with spicy cedar oak in support. It has some gloss combined with intense acidity, a light chalkiness, feels concentrated and pulls a little toasty and savoury on a finish of excellent length, and a bit of lemon zest. Give it a year to settle I’d say. Very nice.

Philip Rich

Philip Rich

Halliday Wine Companion 97 Points

This is always a complex and beautifully crafted wine. On the nose you'll find aromas of white peach, just-ripened apricot, crushed stone and a little praline. On the palate, I really like the interplay between the wine's flavour and texture and the fine thread of acidity, giving the wine both structure and length. It's good now but will be even better in four to six years, if not longer from now. Lovely wine. As good, if not better than, the '23. Just 85 dozen bottles made.

The chardonnay vines are grown on an east facing, gentle slope allowing early morning and late afternoon sunshine. This aspect is perfect to grow top quality chardonnay grapes. Today the average age of the vines is over 40 years, which adds to the complexity of the fruit.

The chardonnay grapes are hand harvested early in the day and then pressed in an air bag press. The juice is then chilled, settled and inoculated with yeast before being transferred to a cool underground cellar for fermentation in new, one and two year old French oak barrels. The wine is left to age on the yeast lees with regular lees stirring to increase the texture of the wine. After around 11 months, the wine is fined and sent to bottle.

The Isabella chardonnay trademark is its elegance and rounded middle palate texture. With time in bottle the fruit flavours develop into complex nuts and toast character with a succulent yet tight finish.

Price Bracket $101 and Above
Type White
Body Medium Bodied
Variety Chardonnay
Country Australia
Region Yarra Valley
Australian State VIC
Reviewed By Halliday Wine Companion
The Weekend Australian
The Wine Front
Critic Score 97
Alcohol 14%
Size 750ml
Vintage 2024
Closure Screw Cap

Wantirna Estate

Wantirna Estate is a family affair, founded in 1963 by Reg and Bertina Egan.

This bucolic old-world-inspired vineyard is located not far from Melbourne town centre; now surrounded by suburbia, the proverbial rose amongst the thorns.

Now run primarily by Reg and Bertina's daughter Maryann, the estate produces a small premium range of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and classic medium-bodied Bordeaux blends that are elegant, classic and exceptional options for the cellar.

Reg describes their vineyard as a "never-ending world of change and enchantment".

Reg & Maryann Egan Wantirna Estate

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