About
For the Wines
"I consider myself lucky to be making wines in the Langhe and even luckier that I have no legacy to follow. It's led to a freedom to play and deconstruct tradition, all in an attempt to start afresh without any boundaries. I'm on a constant search for great vineyards, and always trying to make wines that give a sense of passion and place. Not all of them are single vineyards, because I think great things can come from careful crafting. Not all the wines will be produced each year either, as nature dictates most of what I do.
I use everything I've learnt from my experiences of making wine and working in the vineyards around the world, pulling out the methodology that I believe in and then injecting a few twists and turns.......Hopefully it all works for you!
For those that need to know.....
I use 100% spontaneous fermentation but with a 'pied de cuve' method. I use old wood in the form of Barriques and Botte Grande. Sometimes I have to buy new wood to get old wood and this gets used on the X-blend and the Chardonnay. I never, ever, filter the wines or use fining agents!
In the Vineyards
50% of the vineyards I work with are certified organic and the other half is under conversion. As a day job I work for one of the biggest Biodynamic producers in Barolo and Barbaresco. I believe 100% in these techniques for my own grape production and strive for better health and lower impact for the vines and their surroundings. Not wanting to contribute to an ever increasing mono-culture in the Langhe, I offset the land used for my grape production with ownership of the equivalent area in Forest, swamp and grasslands rich in biodiversity." - Fletcher Wines
2023 Fletcher C23 Langhe Chardonnay
Review by Gary Walsh
Posted on 4 April 2025
'Langhe Chardonnay is an unusual thing. I think of Claudio Viberti, who makes a few of them, and is a bugger for the grape variety in general. I don’t quite know how I feel about it in general, but this is a good wine. I believe this is grown in Barbaresco.
Pear, peach, cashew, spice, aniseed, a subtle struck match thing here too. It’s fleshy and nutty, has a smooth line of fine acidity, a little flinty texture, but it also has presence and restrained power. Almond and spice, a drizzle of lime in the mix, with a finish of excellent length. It’s a flavoursome wine, though it keeps itself pretty trim. A fine and different expression of Chardonnay, and very good it is too.'
94 Points
“On winemaking level for the Chardonnay it’s pretty much like the Favorita. Whole bunch pressed, no sulphur, oxidative handling going through to the barrels. Fermented in wood. It’s about 30% new French oak every year and the rest is varying ages, left on lees for 9 months.” “Harvesting from soils and our climate on white’s tends to generate fatness and glycerol, kind of classic Italian style. To combat that I pick a portion of the whites really early around sparkling production, so around 10% alcohol and that just gives me a thread on the wine, gives it a little bit of electricity through the palate. The second pick always builds body, fruit flavour and aromatics.” - David Fletcher
2023 Fletcher The Minion Nebbiolo
Review by Gary Walsh
Posted on 4 April 2025
'It says Victoria on the label, though it’s from the Yarra Valley.
Red fruit, cherry, a walnutty sort of burr, earl grey tea, a little liquorice and dried rose. It’s a fleshy wine with some brick dust tannin, cherry with a subtle chinotto character, balanced acidity, and some dusty tannin sweeps up the finish. Nicely done. Signature of Nebbiolo is here. and it’s pretty good value with it.'
92 Points
“I feel like Yarra Valley you’re getting good acidity, structure and and an elegant Nebbiolo so it just works better.” - David Fletcher
2021 Fletcher Barbaresco Recta Pete
Review by Gary Walsh
Posted on 4 April 2025
'Roncaglie (40%), Faset (30%) and Ronchi (30%). A strong vintage for Piedmont. Dave Fletcher recently unsubscribed from our newsletter, so I sent him a pretty feisty (but fun! at least to my mind) email, as I’m want to do after a few scoops, suggesting that rather than doing that, he should send The King some of his new releases. And here we are. I’m a squeaky door at times, though sometimes I get oiled as a result. Dave Fletcher is a good bloke.
Very good wine here. Very. Cherry, liquorice, sarsaparilla, a little tea and spice, and quite some dried rose perfume about it. It’s firm and has a distinct graphite feel to tannin, and quite some density too, a ‘mineral’ and stony thing, black tea and lots of fine grip on a finish of excellent length. It’s a beautiful wine. I recommend it highly.'
95 Points
2023 Langhe Nebbiolo DOC
100% Nebbiolo from two different zones. Roero and Barbaresco. 100% destemmed. Open ferment, very littleplunging, every 2 to 3 days. No post ferment soak. Old wood. 300ltr hogs head. Elevage for 12 to 14 months.
“The Langhe Nebbiolo has evolved a little bit from what it was originally. It used to be 100% Roero fruit andcalled Nebbiolo d’Alba because that’s the zoning there. The past few years I’ve been incorporating/blendingwith fruit from young Barbaresco vineyards that’s essentially changed the name to Langhe Nebbiolo becauseit you can’t call it Nebbiolo d’Alba if you’re getting fruit in the Barbaresco zone”
“Two differing parcels go into open top fermenters that post ferment go to old wood for between 12 and 14months aging. We’re running at about 85% Roero, 15% from Barbaresco. But my intention is to move to 100% Barbaresco zone in the future.
“Stylistically the wine is changing and will as we move further to Barbaresco fruit. Roero is famous forNebbiolo because of it’s sandier soil that make wines more approachable. More finer tension, they actuallyevolve quite fast as well, over short periods that become really soft and developed. My intention is to moveover to Barbaresco to reflect what I’m doing with the Barbaresco Crus. The Barbaresco zone from brings inmore complex, more structured version than any other fruit so it just it gives more backbone to the wine, making this blend more serious than just the classical 100% Roero style. So you’ll see that evolution over the next few years as we develop a greater percentage of Barbaresco coming into the Langhe Nebbiolo.”
2022 'Recta Pete' Barbaresco DOCG
David on adding Ronchi Cru to the blend:
“After we lost our Starderi fruit in 2020 I went out looking for a new vineyard and one of the things that I was really interested in was working with purely East facing slope as the weather’s getting warmer. East is becoming a more favorable position because it’s only morning sun. it doesn’t get the west exposure of the afternoon sun which can be quite intense.
I managed to get a parcel of that just to see what it was like and to see whether I could start regularly producing from this site for both Recta Pete and as single Cru bottling as well. So, in 2021 we exactly that, made it separately. We were very happy with the quality but we in fact blended into the Recta Pete. That wasn’t because the quality wasn’t there to be bottled on its own as a Cru but just because our desire was to build the qty of Recta Pete which is our most sought after wine and namesake. We want to have a good entry level Barbaresco coming out every year” - David Fletcher