Carte Blanche White 2021

Carte Blanche literally means ‘white map’… a tabula rasa on which to chart whatever journey moves the spirit. Such is the freedom of the blend. We start this wine with Chardonnay barrels that just don’t fit the single-vineyard profile – rogue outliers with rebellious personalities. We combine them a lashing of Savagnin (10%), a sprinkling of Pinot Gris, a whisper of Grüner (possibly an etc etc here and there) and the surprisingly harmonious result is as friendly and comforting as the layers and layers of a Sara Lee. Apple pie and ice cream, perfumed and soft on the palate, though neither simple nor two-dimensional with signature texture and an enticing beeswax roundness. Drinks precariously easily.

Romato Pinot Gris 2021

Somewhere along the way our passion for rosé evolved into a full-blown love affair with Ramato, traditionally a skin-contact Pinot Grigio from the Friuli region of northern Italy. But ours is a Pinot Gris, which is same-same but different. Whole-bunch ferment with 10 days on skins followed by 10 months in a 500L old French puncheon, a mellow, softening environment. Permit yourself ample time to swirl and wend your way through the aromas – intense, flinty, verging-on-reductive, with hints at Pecorino. Where white Pinot Gris are nectarine and citrus, our Ramato is guava, loquat and quince with salivating tannins. The quintessential long Sunday lunch offering.

Swaby Chardonnay 2020

Swaby absolutely evolves in response the vintage, but you can never accuse her of shrinking away like a violet: some years she breezes past like a cyclone and takes your breath, some she strides with consequence and a forceful click of the heels. 2020 sees her being properly severe and serious, all up in your business with spices and stone fruit. Have you ever noticed how ads on TV sound louder than the show you were just watching? They do not, in fact, turn the volume up to 11. Instead, more sound is actually compressed into the same audio space, exaggerating wavelengths. That’s our Swaby 2020 – concentrated, powerful and filling every possible void. With a pithy back palate and a muscular structure, she’s not even giving away too much just yet. This is a wine that will last in your cellar for a very long time, if you let it. 100% Piccadilly Chardonnay, handpicked, wild-yeast fermentation, whole bunch pressed to barrel, some bâttonage, 10 months in 25% new French oak, unfiltered and unfined, only 100 dozen made.

Archer Beau Chardonnay 2019

One of the cyclical delights over our many years crafting wine has been the opportunity to share our single-barrel, limited edition wines named for our beautiful boys. Archer Chardonnay takes the very best of our Swaby barrels – as determined by Kirsty’s well-honed palate – and preserves it over 15 months in barrel, with nine or 10 months of bâttonage. The full impact of the 2019 vintage can be seen in this wine. More masculine-leaning perhaps than other vintages with an intense nose of biscuits and blackened butter. The palate is at once tight and concentrated but full and smooth, with puckering, gentle acids woven throughout. Simultaneously refined and easy to drink with pithy, custard apple and kumquat notes, sewn in with balanced oak. A genuine delight now, with the robustness to age with considerable grace. (Not unlike Archer the boy.) 100% Piccadilly Valley Chardonnay, wild yeasts, 15 months in 100% new French oak, 9-10 months bâttonage, only one barrel produced.

Carte Blanche Rouge 2021

Ahh, once again, the unbridled joy of the blend! We have afforded ourselves the same carte blanche with our red wine. Shiraz on Pinot Noir lees… maybe even a touch of Pinot Gris? Fun, bright, and approachable, but with multiple layers worthy of light meditative consideration. The cheerful sum of several beautiful parts, the whole ethos behind the Carte Blanche experiment is to fully express the vintage and create a canvass that can be enjoyed just as easily as talked about.

Skin n Bones Pinot Noir 2021

By now Skin-n-Bones – once the punk rock anarchist of the line-up – is a trusted best mate. And in 2021 – a unicorn of a growing season – with no serious heat and a bountiful harvest, there was no pressure to get the fruit off the vine, despite the notoriously narrow Pinot Noir picking window. We have been able to translate this mellowed out, easy-rider spirit straight to the bottle. A Pinot squarely in the frame where we want it to sit every vintage: raspberry red, chewy fruit, undergrowth spice, everything. Young and beautiful with a lingering finish. It truly is all that.

Gower Pinot Noir 2021

Something you will hear about 2020 Adelaide Hills Pinots is that they are light coloured but deep flavoured. In fact, so much so, that in a line-up they will easily be mistaken for Burgundies. Our Gower 2020 is light on the eyes and tawny (certainly in comparison to 2019’s abundance of colour) but deep-forest pine-mushroom soup on the palate, with a dash of sherry. Floral in places, whole-bunch fermentation gives this wine drive and edges. Maple leaves, dark cocoa and a touch of salinity. Drink this seductive wine with steak frites and thank us in the morning.100% Lenswood Pinot Noir, handpicked, 100% whole bunch, wild-yeast fermentation, one month on skins, 10 months in 25% new French oak, unfiltered & unfined, only 100 dozen made.

Remy Pinot Noir 2019

Every time we contemplate 2019 we end up in very similar territory: wines that are particularly expressive of their vineyard of origin and savory almost across the board. Remy 2019 – our single barrel of Gower – has aged gently from its seductive origins at vintage into an attractive balance between fine extraction and salinity. Appealingly ruby in colour with structure and exoticism. Dark cherries and Vietnamese spices, and perhaps – counterintuitively – a truer expression of the vineyard than can be seen with a blend of barrels. The very best Pinot Noirs are like delicious earth with a touch of lift – you can virtually taste the sublime dirt from which this one hails. % Lenswood Pinot Noir, wild yeasts, 15 months in 100% new French oak, only one barrel produced.

Pur Jus Pinot Noir 2021

What started as a collab has now found its place in the range with fruit from a vineyard that has rapidly become a firm favourite. Once upon a time there was a Cabernet Franc vineyard deep within a rocky, riverbed wrinkle in Basket Range. One year out of three, the fruit there would ripen… hardly a sustainable state of affairs. So in a burst of inspiration, Pinot Noir was grafted onto these Cabernet Franc roots in the hope that the shift to a cooler-ripening variety would ensure that fewer harvests ended in tears. And it worked! Mostly. About 10% of the grafts didn’t take and the upshot is that we have our own little pocket of the Loire Valley in our backyard with a mélange of Pinot Noir and Cab Franc. Crispy and fresh, just-ripe cherries with a green tea edge courtesy of the Franc. We could not be happier to have our toes in this lovely little pocket of terroir.