This wine from Shaw + Smith is a medium bodied cool-climate Shiraz where the winemaker's aim is balance over power. The 2017 vintage was very cool, and Shiraz was picked four weeks later than usual. The wine is particularly fragrant as a result of the season.
Reviews & Awards "It’s from such an unusual/cold/late season that shiraz was picked four weeks later than average. It’s a peppery, twiggy, bunchy shiraz. It smells, feels and tastes like the result of a cool season. This wine will split drinkers down the middle. It’s smoky, herbal, berried, smooth-skinned and stringy at once. It both walks the tightrope and is one. There are menthol, alpine herb, walnut and peppercorn characters here in abundance. There are also substantial ropes of well-placed tannin. It’s a medium-bodied wine with a great deal to say." 95 Points - Campbell Mattinson, The Wine Front, November 2019, Drink: 2022 - 2032+
"Medium to deep colour, with a strong whole bunch bouquet, very vegetal and undergrowth like, the palate leanish and nervy, crisp and firm with some astringency and good intensity. It lingers on well and has a sinewy texture. Very spicy and bunchy. A very interesting style – a cool – climate shiraz with power and depth." 95 Points - Huon Hooke, December 2019
The Adelaide Hills was long considered too cool to ripen Shiraz. By the early 2000s, though, the potential for outstanding Shiraz from the right sites in the Adelaide Hills was compelling, and the first Shaw + Smith Shiraz was made in the 2002 vintage. Since then, Shiraz in the Hills has gone from strength to strength, its hallmarks being fragrance, intensity, and medium bodied elegance.
Hand picked and fermented as a combination of whole berries and whole bunches in open fermenters, with gentle plunging and minimal working. Aged in French oak for fourteen months, of which one third was new.
The 2017 vintage was very cool, and Shiraz was picked four weeks later than usual. The wine is particularly fragrant as a result of the season. Winery Notes
