Winery & Vintage Info
St Hallett was established in 1944 with modest ambitions for the future and an agricultural attitude to winemaking. Today St Hallett is proudly one of the Barossa’s leading wineries and specialises in the region’s most heralded grape variety, Shiraz. From the consistency of Faith through to the majesty of Old Block, St Hallett’s reputation as the Masters of Barossa Shiraz as been hard earned over many decades.
Many wine legends have had their imprint on the cellar and have helped shape the modern St Hallett, but none more critical than Stuart Blackwell. Stuart started at St Hallett in 1972 and ensuring integrity and a steadfast commitment to the region, has steered St Hallett to become a jewel in the crown of the Barossa. The Blackwell Shiraz was first released in 1994, in Stuart’s honour and his tireless contribution to the St Hallett story.
The Barossa has a diverse topography of valleys and slopes with elevations ranging from 130 metres in the southern Barossa Valley, through to 550 metres on the cool elevated ridges of the Eden Valley. Fruit for the Blackwell Shiraz is sourced predominately from Northern Barossa from vineyards in the parishes of Ebenezer, Greenock and Moppa Hills.
A very dry winter and spring lead to early vineyard intervention to keep soil profiles moist. Frost and hail also assisted with yield reduction at flowering, resulting in low cropping though high-quality fruit. The outcome was the lowest yielding Barossa vintage in a decade and although low, the vines worked hard and pushed all of the energy into the remaining fruit which gave way to tremendous quality and balance in the wines.
Individual parcels are harvested and treated as single batches in the winery. The fruit was de-stemmed and transferred to various sized fermenters based on the batch size. Yeast selection, pump over regime and ferment temperature varied, based on the characters of the block with fermentation typically around 24-26°C and time on skins between 10 and 12 days. Malolactic fermentation took place in the fermenter. After pressing, the parcels were filled to American oak barrels, where they matured for 12-16 months.
