Lansdowne Estate Wairarapa Syrah 2016 $46
Nine years on from vintage, and this syrah is heading into its tertiary period, where the fruit is morphing into deeply savoury, gamey spectrums, the once peppery aromatics are now more leather and earth-focused, and the tannins have softened considerably.
Shepherded from berry to bottle by local legend Karl Johner, this Syrah has some serious historic pedigree. Early settler William Beetham held extensive land holdings in the Wairarapa Valley, and his wife, Frenchwoman Marie Zelie, planted grapes to remind her of home. They planted carefully sourced cuttings of Hermitage (Syrah) and Pinot around their Lansdowne Homestead in Masterton in the early 1880s. These classic grapevines flourished, and they then moved them to a vineyard of about six acres which he established nearby, in a vale within the valley, on the bank of the Ruamahunga river. This became the first successful commercial vineyard in the Wairarapa. The vines were then pulled out during prohibition.
In 1998, Margaret and Derek Hagar bought land on the west bank of the Ruamahanga River, which was part of the original Lansdowne Estate. The terrain with its dry climate, cool nights and long hot sunny days with stony, clay over limestone soil compares favourably with any in the world for the cultivation of Burgundian wines. After several years of hard struggle in the stony, free-draining soil, Pinot Gris, Pinot Noir and Syrah were again established at Lansdowne. The six acres planted are about the same size as the original vineyard. It’s believed they’re on, or very near to, the original site, being less than a kilometre from the original homestead.
