• Dessert style
• Dried apricot
• BBQ pineapple
• Creamy & full-bodied

"Bright, even, medium yellow gold. This has a rich, engaging bouquet packed with aromas of smoke flint and spice overlying apricot, citrus peels, honey and quince paste. Full-bodied, aromas of dried apricot entwined with lemon curd, peach puree, unfolding citrus peels, honey, quince paste, cardamon, ginger and smoke flint. The mouthfeel is opulent; creamy, honey-like texture sustains powerful layers and structure, along with zingy acidity persists a lengthy, refined finish. This Noble Semillon Sauvignon is powerful and harmonious, opulently expressed with finesse and complexity" Candice Chow, Raymond Chan Reviews, May 2024

"This really is a delicious wine, exotic and fruity, aromas of orange and cape gooseberry, the signature of Sauvignon Blanc offers sweet bell-pepper and mano, pineapple and preserved citrus peel. The Semillon deliver s a grapefruit and hay quality, honey and ginger. Deliciously sweet as the wine touches the palate, exotic and fruity, waxy and fresh. High acidity easily counterbalances the residual sweet (182 gpl), there’s a silky creamy texture and lengthy finish. Best drinking from 2024 through 2304+" Cameron Douglas, Master Sommelier, Apr 2024

On release it has a bright gold hue. A rich tapestry of aromas surge from the glass, dried apricot, honeycomb, and lemon curd interwoven with hints of toffee apple, coconut, and BBQ pineapple. The mouthfeel is unctuously decadent, multilayered, and textural, caressing all areas of the palate. Full bodied and generously proportioned, yet balanced with a core of invigorating acidity, ensuring the wine retains focus and finesse, leading to a prolonged and harmonious finish.

The vineyard is located within the Waipara Valley of North Canterbury, on free draining, north facing terraces. It benefits from being in the lee of the Teviotdale Range, giving maximum protection from the Pacific’s easterly breezes and thus creating a unique mesoclimate. The vines are over 30 years old, with a large proportion planted on their own roots. They are located on the “Glasnevin Gravels” where greywacke stones, silt and loam have been washed down from the mountains over the millennia. The soil is of low fertility, resulting in naturally reduced vine vigour. This produces low yields of optimally ripened, high quality, flavourful grapes, which fully express the qualities of this unique terroir. The vineyard has warm days, but the nights are amongst the coolest in the Waipara Valley, drawing out the ripening period of the grapes, while still retaining good natural acidity.

Cold weather during bud burst resulted in lower crop levels, hence no further fruit thinning was carried out. The subsequent warm dry summer served up perfectly ripened small berries full of intense flavour and concentration. Late season conditions were favourable for the development of noble botrytis, essential to produce this wine style.

Finale is part of our reserve series and is only made in exceptional years, being dependent on specific conditions at the end of the season leading to noble rot. Modelled on a French Sauternes using traditional Bordeaux techniques, the wine is a Semillon/Sauvignon blend. Only the most beautifully raisined, perfectly botrytic bunches were selected to make this wine. A small amount of very concentrated juice was then obtained from these grapes and put into new French artisan oak barriques (50% new), where the two varieties were left to ferment separately. The wine was then matured in these barriques on its natural deposits of yeast lees (sur lie) for 12 months, prior to blending and bottling.