Tolpuddle Vineyard Pinot Noir 2016
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Robert
Parker -
Wine
Spectator -
James
Suckling
Product Details
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Somm Note
Winemaker Notes
This wine is true to the Tolpuddle Vineyard Pinot Noir style: intensely aromatic, balanced with savoury spice notes from whole bunch fermentation, along with purity of varietal expression, fresh acidity, and firm tannins. The 2016 vintage is very perfumed, medium bodied and approachable.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2016 Pinot Noir is lovely. Tasmania is capable of a glossy kind of abundance when it comes to Pinot Noir fruit—it's never overt, but it has a plentitude about it. This is the perfect example of that ample, enveloping potential. The good and tempering aspect here is the cage of tannins created by the whole bunch that holds the fruit in place and discourages it from straying off the path. A super wine. So lovely. Best After 2022
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Wine Spectator
Distinctive and expressive, with a thread of fresh tomato leaf, sage and thyme amid the crisp strawberry and cranberry core, the tannins gaining traction on the finish, where a fresh earth note mingles. Drink now through 2023.
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James Suckling
A juicy pinot with lots of dried strawberry and lemon zest character. Medium to full body. Tangy. Easy now but better in 2017. Screw cap.
Other Vintages
2022-
Australian Wine
Companion - Decanter
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James
Suckling
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Robert
Parker -
Wine
Spectator -
James
Suckling -
Wine
Enthusiast
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James
Suckling -
Robert
Parker -
Wine
Spectator -
Wine
Enthusiast
- Decanter
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Robert
Parker -
Wine
Enthusiast -
James
Suckling
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James
Suckling -
Robert
Parker
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James
Suckling -
Robert
Parker
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James
Suckling -
Robert
Parker -
Wine
Spectator
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Robert
Parker
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Robert
Parker
Tolpuddle Vineyard was established in 1988 and it took its name from the Tolpuddle Martyrs: English convicts transported to Tasmania for forming an agricultural union. The leader of the Martyrs, George Loveless, served some of his sentence working on a property near Richmond, part of which is now Tolpuddle Vineyard.
The vineyard is planted with mature Chardonnay and Pinot Noir vines, facing north-east, and sloping gently up from Back Tea Tree Road. The soil is light silica over sandstone and of moderate vigour, ensuring well-balanced vines producing grapes of great flavour and intensity.
In 2006 Tolpuddle Vineyard won the inaugural Tasmanian Vineyard of the Year award, reflecting the performance of this unique and distinguished site.
Martin Shaw and Michael Hill Smith MW purchased the vineyard in 2011 and are fully committed to seeing Tolpuddle Vineyard recognised as one of Australia’s great single vineyards.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Directly south of the city of Melbourne and the Mornington Peninsula wine region, the cool-climate island of Tasmania has earned an honorable reputation as the country’s finest producer of Sparkling Wine. Naturally the region also excels in top quality still wines from Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Riesling, all distinguished because of a high natural acidity. Most of the Tasmania vineyards cluster around the eastern side of the island from north to south.