Pinot Noir

"Deep ruby in the glass with aromas of dark cherry, wild strawberry and plum fruits cut with hints of game, sous bois, spice, shoyu, mushroom terrine, purple flowers and crushed rock. There's an appealing earthiness that underlies the fruit on the palate, a fine-boned minerality that drives the wine forward. Finishes with a composed flourish of chalk, spice and pure cherry and raspberry tones." Dave Brookes Wine Companion 94/100   The Real Review: #8 Best Tasmanian Pinot Noir for 2024

Winery Note: It's a rare treat to have a wine or three that we hold for five plus years and are able to assess many bottles over the time to enjoy and contemplate. Normally the wines are grown, made, bottled and sold out within 15 to 18 months. With Darshan and Block 8 we have had the opportunity to see many bottles of these wines, to understand the vineyards, the seasons, their personalities and to evolve our expectations. It's been a treat. The 2018 season was a little warmer than 2017. The nose is floral, ethereal even, with sweet, wild forest fruits. Added complexity comes from aromas of brown spices, game and...

The Bindi Dixon Pinot Noir is based upon declassified grapes from the Original Vineyard planted in 1988 and grapes from the new Block K, planted in 2001. The ideal of this wine is to produce a delicious, perfumed, spicy harmonious, textured wine that is not as intense, complex nor ageworthy as our individual vineyard wines. Even when the outstanding Block K vines are older we will continue to declassify sections or barrels from each vineyard and produce this wine. The wine is fermented the same way as our other Pinot Noirs in that it is ostensibly 100% de-stemmed and gently worked in small open vats. The wine spends 11 months in French...

The Bindi Dixon Pinot Noir is based upon declassified grapes from the Original Vineyard planted in 1988 and grapes from the new Block K, planted in 2001. The ideal of this wine is to produce a delicious, perfumed, spicy harmonious, textured wine that is not as intense, complex nor ageworthy as our individual vineyard wines. Even when the outstanding Block K vines are older we will continue to declassify sections or barrels from each vineyard and produce this wine. The wine is fermented the same way as our other Pinot Noirs in that it is ostensibly 100% de-stemmed and gently worked in small open vats. The wine spends 11 months in French...

Sit back and take in the aromas from a glass of this pinot as you think about sitting at the top of the vineyard surrounded by cows, water, grass and all things Western District farming. Sweet and sour cherries, earth, spice and a lovely elegant structure.   The Irrewarra brand is a relatively young brand but with a now mature vineyard site planted in 2001 by the Calvert family of famed Irrewarra Sourdough Bakery. Inspired by time spent in Burgundy during the 1992 vintage Bronwyn and John decided to plant a dry farmed Chardonnay and Pinot Noir site. The Farr Family decided to make the site their own with the help of the Calvert's...

Located in Victoria’s Western District, about 150km south-west of Melbourne, Irrewarra is a distinctive vineyard surrounded by volcanic plains and inland lakes. Exposed to the elements, the site benefits from high natural rainfall, adding to its cool-climate charm. Planted by the Calvert family in 2001, the vineyard features 6 acres of Pinot Noir and 2 acres of Chardonnay, all on own roots. Positioned on a slope overlooking two large lakes, the site expresses remarkable varietal character and complexity. Now under the care of the Farr family, Nick Farr manages the vineyard with the same attention and dedication as his Geelong estate....

The RP Pinot Noir (RP – Robyn Pamela) is in recognition of the matriarch. It is not only the support and goffering that Robyn has endured for Gary’s 40 year career. She has been in the vineyard and planted the first vines, driven the tractors, filled barrels and pigeaged at midnight. If we are ever a man down Robyn has always been the first one we have called to fill the void no matter the job, no matter the time of day. You can always count on mum.   The fruit for this wine is sourced from the Cote Vineyard as is the GC Chardonnay. A close planted / high density planting of Pinot Noir on a exposed cote. These hillsides...

Sangreal by Farr, Pinot Noir 2023 Sour cherry and cream. Green pepper, cornichon, dried citrus peel. Loads of brown spice like mace, cloves and even a waft of cardamom. Ripe plum, dark cherries, dried earth and a warmth, not from alcohol but generosity of flavour. The wine is so welcoming. I just had the smallest sip, and this wine just mushrooms out, that classic peacocks tail writ large across my palate. It’s so intense and complex. It has an acid level equal to its myriad layers, which just heightens the excitement of this wine. In my wine life I have tasted many wines, but no winery l can think of comes close to a house style as...

98 pts   Huon Hooke(The Real Review)   Deep and bright, youthful colour with lots of purple in the rim and great limpidity. The first aroma is of root vegetables, potato and parsnip, gradually giving way to rich ripe dark cherry that floods the palate with succulent sweet fruit flavour and beautifully balanced fine-grained tannins. The tannins provide a backbone and a counter-balance to all that opulent fruit. A totally impressive and convincing pinot noir. It has wow factor.  Drinking window  2024 – 2041. "Amazingly integrated at this early stage which is not a classic marker for this...

"With every year that passes, the Tout Pres vineyard’s subtleness and delicate fruit structure are becoming increasingly pronounced in the wine. The bouquet fills the glass with spicy fruit, mineral elements and a hint of integrated French oak, with the darkness and essence of the Moorabool Valley true expressions of site. This wine exhibits primary and secondary flavours, which strengthen the overall integration for a seamless finish. It is a tightly packed combination of plums and undergrowth with an edgy acidity—and one of our favourite drops." -  Wine by Farr.

Nick Ryan 96 points.  "This is a wine of whispered power, finely etched etched detail and sublimely subtle texture. Black cherries and dried strawberries, a rippling seam of baking spices, a beguiling bass line of sweet earthiness. It's the sinewy athleticism that really impresses here, the wine delivers plenty without getting paunchy. It's alert, energetic and rolls across the palate with effortless momentum. This is not Joy Division, but Joy Multiplied." NR. From the makers.... "DECADES is the culmination of a lifelong friendship and the realisation of hundreds of chats about making wine together....

Winery Notes: TASTING NOTES This year’s Estate Pinot presents with a bright brick red colour and brilliant clarity.  Typical of the wines of 2024 it has a generous nose of red currant and hints of the richer blue fruits found in a warmer season.  It is framed by savoury spice delicate oak tones and just a hint of earthy forest floor.  Supporting that is a classic Delamere palate of beautiful savoury tannins and luscious pomegranate acidity.  The combination of fruit weight and acidity suggests a wine, if carefully cellared, will evolve to be one of our great vintages and worthy of the wait.

"Brings cool-climate virtuosity to the glass with a pinot that is both wild in nature and elegant in purpose. Sour cherry, cranberry, dried leaves, briar and earthy scents are then mirrored on the palate, which is well defined by a sinewy, fine tannin presence. Clean and precise in delivery, with a cranberry-like tartness that gets the gastric juices in a whirl." Jenni Port Wine Companion 93/100   "Luminous, clear and clean. Amped up crunch yet still quiet and calm. Rock candy, mandarin orange and exotic spice. WIth neighbours like Giaconda and Savaterre - it echoes its sense of place with grace and focus." RR4WEA

MELBOURNE ROYAL WINE AWARDS 2023 Jimmy Watson Memorial Trophy for Most Outstanding Young Red James Halliday Trophy for Best Pinot Noir   ROYAL ADELAIDE WINE SHOW 2023 Best Pinot Noir of Show Trophy   AUSTRALIAN PINOT NOIR CHALLENGE 2023 Best Pinot Noir   HALLIDAY WINE COMPANION 2025, 98 POINTS. Boom! You'll probably have to scurry around to secure some bottles of this, as it won the coveted Jimmy Watson Trophy at the 2023 Melbourne Royal Wine Awards, but it is worth the hunt. It's a beautiful wine with a brilliant ruby hue in the glass and aromas of ripe dark cherry, dried cranberry and raspberry coulis...

  DAVE BROOKS, HALLIDAY WINE COMPANION 2024, 96 POINTS. "Made with 100% whole cluster, pressed directly to 500L French oak puncheons (15% new) for 13 months. There's a lot going on here – all of it good. Bright red cherry, red plum and raspberry pip tones with hints of cocoa powder, pomegranate, Chinese barbecue joint, amaro, souk-like spice, leaf litter, struck flint, XO sauce, shiitake broth and earth. Pure and spicy red fruits, fine, powdery tannins and a mineral-laden acidity that seems to pull the flavours forward on the palate, finishing long, savoury and true with everything plumb and tickety boo. Just...

HALLIDAY WINE COMPANION 2025 Single-site pinot noir from the Glengarry vineyard to the north-west of Launceston. An airy ruby in the glass. There's great detail and clarity in this wine. A translucent curtain of raspberry, red cherry and cranberry fruits offers glimpses of other characters behind. Souk-like spice and amaro herbs, wildflowers, Chinese barbecue tones, ginger tea, softly spoken oak, pomegranate, mushroom broth and gamey meats. It shows a wonderful sense of space and composure with lacy, mineral acidity providing luminensence, form and cadence, gliding savoury and true to its destination. 97 points.   #FOGG   #LOWE

Australia’s oldest Pinot Noir vineyard, planted in 1921 by Maurice O’Shea. The vines from this block have given the Australian Wine Industry the famed MV6 clone which is now planted throughout the greatest Pinot Noir grape-growing regions in Australia.   Still producing today, these vines are carefully tended and provide wines of structure and power.   Widely accepted as Australia's 'mothervine' vineyard, from which the extensively planted MV6 pinot noir clone was sourced, this site was planted in 1921 by Maurice O'Shea. The vineyard traces its origins to cuttings brought to Australia by James...

A blend of 80% Shiraz and 20% Pinot Noir. Small production. Big heart. 95 points - Mike Bennie The Wine Front "Cor blimey, this is a wine! Such beautiful texture, vibrancy, shimmering cherry juice and cranberry tang, layers of spice, herb, a bristling line of acidity and such fine and shape-giving tannins. It’s one of those wines that feels beautiful let alone tastes delicious. Lighter weight style with all the structure. Super stuff here." Halliday Wine Companion, 95 points. The tension between tannin, acidity, savoury nuances and fruit is high. It feels as though all the components here are sitting straight and alert....

A four-vineyard, six-clone blend; 20% wholes bunches, 15% new oak. A bright crimson red. A lifted bouquet redolent of summer red fruits, poached rhubarb, rose bush and white pepper. The energetic palate is light to medium bodied with the wine's fine-grained tannins and bright acidity making for a delicious and refreshing mouthful. Good, nay, great now and over the next 3–4 years. 95 points. Philip Rich Published 13 January 2025

A single-vineyard wine from the Surf Coast, the vineyard planted in 2001; 40% whole bunches and matured in 25% new barriques. A bright crimson ruby. From a cool vineyard and it shows, in a good, way. Aromas of strawberries, cranberries and a little spice. You barely notice the whole bunches, which are already integrating into the wine. Elegantly wrought, delicate and persistent on the palate. Thoughtful winemaking here and I like how Ben has worked with the fruit, rather than trying to make something the wine isn't.  97 points. Philip Rich Published 23 April 2024

A single-vineyard wine from the Surf Coast, the vineyard planted in '01; 80% whole bunches and matured in 30% new barriques. A bright, deep crimson. Ultra perfumed and lifted with its bouquet of brambly red fruits, rose bush and warm spices. Medium bodied, this is both sumptuous and beautifully delineated on the very long, classically structured palate. Absolutely tops from beginning to end and a wine destined to age effortlessly over the next decade or longer. 97 points. Philip Rich Published 29 April 2025

A beautifully structured single-vineyard Pinot Noir from Geelong, Victoria. Planted in 1994, the old vine fruit is really starting to shine with concentrated flavours of wild strawberry, kirsch and some delicate herbal notes. A combination of winemaking techniques are also at play here, with some whole bunch fermentation bringing fresh fruit aromatics, while a touch of ageing in new oak delivers texture and complexity. It's a great of example of the high quality Pinots we're coming to expect from this cooler, coastal region of Australia. James Suckling 92 points. The Wine Front 93 points.

A single vineyard located right on the water in Port Arlington. All 1998-planted MV6 clones; 40% whole bunches, 25% new oak barriques. A medium and very bright crimson purple. Aromas of wild strawberries and kirsch sit alongside whole-bunch derived notes of white pepper and dried mountain herbs. Concentrated and balanced, this flows nicely across the palate with its silky tannins and bright, juicy, acidity. 96 points. Philip Rich Published 16 June 2023.

A single vineyard located right on the water in Port Arlington. All '98-planted MV6 clones; 30% whole bunches, 25% new oak. A deep ruby red. Concentrated with dark fruits, earth, licorice root and a little iodine. Similarly rich on the flavoursome, still closed, but even and well-structured palate that finishes with a burst of robust, meaty tannins. It'll need some time but, rest assured, your patience will be rewarded. 96 points. Philip Rich Published 28 April 2025

A single-vineyard wine planted with MV6 and Abel clones in the late '90s; 20% whole bunches. A bright crimson. Elegant and restrained with aromas of red cherry, rose petals and spices such as Sichuan pepper and star anise together with a little new-oak pencil-shaving scents. The palate is similarly elegant and fine boned and I like the way this keeps building as it sits in the glass. The tannins are superfine and persistent. The most reticent, perhaps, of the five single-vineyard wines but a wine that will no doubt age superbly. 96 points. Philip Rich Published 28 April 2025

Hand-picked fruit. Wild-yeast fermented with 30% whole bunches in open-top vats. On skins for 9 days, mlf and 8 months' maturation in 20% new French oak. Moorabool Valley fruit, even though just bottled when tasted, is in fine form indeed, revealing good depth and concentration. Lifted, fragrant and pure, with the subtlest oak and confident handling. Sweet raspberry, dusty red cherry, musk, bramble and bracken glide across the palate. An exciting early start to a wine that will shine. 95 points. Jeni Port Published 13 August 2021

JH 90. WINERY NOTE: It all starts with the vineyard, paying careful attention to pruning and the health of the vines. Cool climate vineyards enable the vines to produce rich flavours and characters over a longer growing season. Our Pinots have never been shy in colour and the 2018 vintage is no exception - gorgeous crimson red with a hint of purple. Aromas of cranberry, lavender, violet and herbs. The plate is supple with soft tannins, leading to a long, lingering finish. Closure: Screw Cap Perfect with cold tea smoked duck!

2024 Yarra Valley Wine Show.....Wine of Show / Best Red Wine / Best Pinot Noir / GOLD. "From '98 plantings of MV6 at Gladysdale; 30% whole bunches. Matured in 300L and 500L casks (less than 10% new). Pretty and delicate with its aromas of alpine strawberries, rose petal and spice. More depth than the '21. Impeccably balanced and light on its feet, fine grained and ever so gently chewy tannins round out a wine that's approachable now but will keep. 95 points." Philip Rich Published 20 February 2024   #BLINDP  

From 40-plus-year-old vines planted in Gladysdale on red volcanic soils. A deep-ish crimson red. With its bouquet of freshly poached strawberries, rose petals and a little hedgerow, this is the most accessible now of the three Vineyard Series pinots. Even more so on the silky smooth, nicely balanced palate, which exudes an old-vine creaminess. I'd drink this quite delicious wine now and over the next four to six years. 96 points. Philip Rich Published 12 August 2025

The Oakridge 2023 Yarra Valley Pinot Noir has an immediate explosion of fruit aromas on the nose, with dark cherry, blackberry and pomegranate with elements of spice and toast adding complexity. The palate displays a lush and layered density of fruit with dark cherry and red berry flavours with plush fruit tannins woven in adding complexity. There is a soft yet bright acid line providing drive and length to wine before the classic fantail finish of a great Yarra Pinot Noir.

"Coal River Valley pinot noir made by Samantha Connew. A very pretty bright ruby in the glass with aromas of amaro and blossom-flecked red cherry, raspberry and wild strawberry fruits underscored with hints of spice, Peking duck, leaf litter, dried citrus rind, struck flint and earth. It smells gorgeous, and the palate follows up with smallgoods and undergrowth and mountain herb tones, finishing long with detail, sapid acidity and powdery tannins – it's a wonderful release. If you're ever down Tassie way, make sure you check out the new Pressing Matters cellar door too. It's a beauty. 96 points." Dave Brookes ...

The Real Review 96 points. The grapes were fully destemmed and given a three-day cold soak prior to each clone being fermented separately. Vibrant red and purple colours in the glass and equally vibrant aromatics of red cherry, smoked pork and hints of reductive flint. Finely wrought tannins and acidity lift and drive light to medium weighted red fruits long across the tongue, hints of reduction adding character along with an undertone of truffle and speck. The finish is prodigious, yet finely detailed. A wine of tension and precision, with everything working in harmony. (Screwcap) Score: 96  ★★★★★ 

A blend of fruit from three sites and all planted with MV6. A gorgeous, light, bright crimson purple. This leaps out of the glass with its aromas of freshly picked cherries, blood orange and mountain herbs. The palate is moreish, energetic and fine boned. Super value, you'd be delighted if this was on by the glass at your local cafe or pub. 95 points. Philip Rich Published 09 September 2024

Wild-yeast fermentation, aged in 25% new 500L French puncheons. An attractive light ruby red. Elegant and perfumed, this opens with aromas of wild strawberries, redcurrants, blood orange and floral notes. Poised and silky in the mouth, this really is quite persistent and beautifully balanced. A very good effort from go to whoa. Will be even better two to three years from now. 96 points. Philip Rich Wine Companion Published 06 July 2023   WINERY NOTE: The concept behind our Equilibrio range is to promote the very best barrels, clonal mix and new oak integration to create a wine that will benchmark the potential of each vintage. Some...

Three clones (MV6, 115, D4V2) go into this single-vineyard blend. Matured in 20% new 500L French puncheons. A light, bright crimson. Fragrant with aromas of ripe strawberries, freshly picked cherries, a little rose petal and spice. This builds nicely on the medium-bodied palate before finishing with balanced, gently grippy yet silky tannins. Nicely done. 93 points. Philip Rich Published 27 November 2023

Wine Pilot 94: "There is something rather nifty about looking at a wine, making assessments and doing the review, only then to discover that the price is way below what you would have assumed for the wine. This is very much one of those wines. Absolutely cracking value. I really did have to check twice to make sure I had it right. Pale garnet in colour, there are spices, florals, violets, cherries and cranberries all evident on the nose. A silky texture throughout, this is a most refreshing style, through to satiny tannins and an impressive persistent finish. Delicious and beautifully crafted, this will provide considerable pleasure...

From the Six Js vineyard in Steels Creek and planted in 1992. A superb bright, light crimson. Brian Conway has a way with gamay, and it shows in this vibrant wine. Lifted with its notes of freshly picked raspberries and cranberries that sit alongside some crushed pink peppercorns and dried mountain herbs. The palate is delicious with silky tannins rounding out a wine that can be served and enjoyed anywhere from 13–16 degrees, depending on the weather. 95 points. Philip Rich Published 19 November 2024.

From the Six Js vineyard in Steels Creek planted in '92. A light, bright crimson purple. Gently reticent at first before revealing piquant aromas of red cherries, delicate spice and potpourri. Persistent and nicely structured on the tensile, refreshing palate. I can see this opening up and becoming more complex over the next 12–24 months. 94 pointrs. Philip Rich Published 13 February 2025

From a single vineyard in Steels Creek and made solely from their plantings of clone G5V15. A lively, bright crimson, and this really hits the spot. Red and black fruits coalesce with aromas of lightly crushed violets and a touch of blood orange. The medium-bodied palate is pure fruited, persistent and wrapped inside crunchy and energetic tannins. It's delicious now but it would be a shame not to have a few bottles to open in 5–8 years. 96 points. Philip Rich Published 13 February 2025

From a single vineyard in Steels Creek planted in '92. Another excellent wine from this under-the-radar producer. A light, bright crimson. Fragrant from the first whiff. Aromas of red cherries, pomegranate, incense and floral notes precede the energetic and really nicely balanced palate. A joy to drink now and over the next 4–6 years. 95 points. Philip Rich Published 13 February 2025.