Winery: Leeuwin Estate
Region: Margaret River
Variety: Chardonnay
Vintage: 2008
Your Wine Guy says:
One of only 2 white wines to be listed in the Exceptional category of Langton’s Fine Wine Classification, the other is Giaconda’s Chardonnay.
The 2008 still looks a little young in the glass with bright pale straw colour and a greenish tinge at the edges. The nose is complex and powerful as always showing intense varietal characters of peach, grapefruit and cashew, toast and spicy oak characters. The palate is rich and powerful with a smooth creamy texture displaying intense flavours of white peach, nectarine, pear combine with spicy, nutty, toasted oak that linger for a very long time on the palate. The Art Series is a wonderful wine that can live in the cellar for more than 15 years, if you can keep your hands off it that is.
97 Points YWG Drink to 2022+
Critics say:
“Although tasted a good 8 months before release this appears to be one of the most delicate and restrained of all Leeuwin Art Series chardies. Yet, in keeping with this famous block, there is depth and power of extraordinary intensity. The palate is woven into a tight lean thread moving with relentless precision to a very long finish. There's some minerally tightness and a bracing acidity that holds it all together. Destined for greatness.”
Rating 98 Points Ray Jordan's 2011 WA Wine Guide
“Leeuwin Estate Art Series Chardonnay is one of Australia's rare long-lived fine-boned Chardonnays with superb fruit definition and clarity. When youthful, they are a balance between exuberant fruit and savoury complexity. The palate is creamy yet a fine bead of acid cuts a swathe across the palate giving life and incredible length. With a few years of bottle maturity, the Art Series Chardonnay seems to shed its aniseed top notes. The wine becomes a harmonious whole with beautifully defined grapefruit/melon aromas and complex lanolin nuances. The palate is richer and fleshier but remains tightly bound by mineral acidity.”
Andrew Caillard MW Langton’s Fine Wine Classification V – Exceptional
The winemaker says:
Colour: The colour is a brilliant straw green.
Nose: An incredibly complex and lifted bouquet of ripe golden pear skin, peach, savoury toasted ground almonds and white nectarine. This wine is showing multiple layers of fruit and subtle class driven French oak. The result of very low yielding vines matched with subtle winemaking preserves the richness and intensity of fruit.
Palate: The palate displays a full bodied vibrant wine on the entry, with a creaminess and intense purity of fruit. Pear, nectarine and peaches are the main fruit flavours followed by a subtle sweet spice and almonds. The flavours are seamlessly long with a wonderful natural acid finish. - Leeuwin Estate
Winery/Label Information:
Leeuwin Estate has sixty-two acres of Chardonnay vines divided into eight distinct parcels. The soil and slopes of the plantings differ in each area and the cultural aspects of the viticulture are tailored to each parcel, therefore varying slightly. Since the 1980 vintage Leeuwin Estate has adhered to vertical training and leaf removal to present the Chardonnay fruit properly to the light. The soil management has remained the same since inception. Variations and deficiencies in the soils of individual blocks have not been completely corrected so that the wines reflect the soil wherever possible.
Each plot is harvested separately and kept separate throughout the winemaking and some of the maturation programme. The wines reflect these differences intimately and unfailingly from the beginning. For example, Block 20, the "Front Gate" Chardonnay, always is the basis and the backbone of the "Art Series" wine. The young wine begins with true varietal power of great delicacy which then actually requires up to 12 months of lees contact in new French Oak in order to draw out the complexity; losing none of that essential balance in the process. Block 21, "Denis' Road", on the other hand, always gives a full, sweet and soft wine requiring less wood maturation in most years and resulting in an obvious "Prelude".
“This outstanding winery and vineyard is owned by the Horgan family, with parents Denis and Tricia at the helm, son Justin as general manager. The Art Series Chardonnay is, in my opinion, Australia's finest example, based on the wines of the last 28 vintages. The decision to move to screwcap in 2004 brought a large smile to the faces of those who understand just how superbly the wine ages, unless sabotaged by sporadic oxidation (caused by cork). The large estate plantings, coupled with strategic purchases of grapes from other growers, provide the base for high-quality Art Series Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz; a hugely successful, quick-selling Art Series Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc; and lesser priced wines such as Prelude Chardonnay and Siblings Sauvignon Blanc Semillon.” James Halliday Wine Companion
In his Wine Atlas of Australia and New Zealand, leading wine writer, James Halliday writes "One can only stand in awe of the achievements of Leeuwin Estate and the Horgans in their unrelenting pursuit of excellence…" Following a review of 19 vintages of "Art Series" Chardonnays, Halliday concludes "This is Australia's greatest Chardonnay and one of the great wines of the world". In Australian Gourmet Traveller WINE Magazine, Halliday has written: "Leeuwin is a class act, every facet of its business working with the precision of a Swiss watch. It stands at the very forefront of estate-based, family owned wineries, its chardonnay widely regarded as Australia's finest, ranking with the world's best." – Leeuwin Estate
Leeuwin Estate, one of the founding wineries of the now famous Margaret River district, consistently produces wines that rank with the worlds finest.
In 1972, following an extensive search for the area most suitable to produce the best varietal wines in Australia, legendary American winemaker, Robert Mondavi, identified the future site of the Leeuwin vineyard.
Originally a cattle farm, Leeuwin Estate evolved, under the direction of Denis and Tricia Horgan, with Robert Mondavi acting as consultant and mentor.
A nursery was planted in 1974 and the initial vineyards were deep-ploughed, deep-ripped, emptied of stone, planned, pegged, measured, marked and eventually planted by hand over a five year period from 1975.
Featuring state-of-the art facilities, the winery building was opened in 1978, celebrating with a trial vintage. Leeuwin enjoyed its first commercial vintage in 1979, and was thrust into the international spotlight when Decanter Magazine gave its highest recommendation to the 1980 "Art Series" Chardonnay in an international blind tasting. – Leeuwin Estate
Leeuwin Estate produces Shiraz, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Merlot, Sauvignon Blanc Semillon, Pinot Noir Chardonnay Brut and their inimitable flagship Art Series Chardonnay.
Labels include:
Siblings - Sauvignon Blanc Semillon, Shiraz
Prelude Vineyards - Chardonnay, Cabernet Merlot
Art Series - Chardonnay, Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc, Shiraz, Cabernet Sauvignon |