Vasse Felix Tom Cullity Cabernet Sauvignon-Malbec 2013
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Blend: 76% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Malbec, 4% Petit Verdot
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
That this is an elegant wine is the first thing to note here. The nose has hints of gravel and leafy nuances — a textbook regional expression. It's really seductive, and there's a fusion of bright and vibrant redcurrants, boysenberries and red cherries together with cassis and blue plums as well as mulberries. Some fresh, violet-like florals and freshly cut herbs also come into play along with pomegranate and deliciously fresh and cedary oak that's well played in behind vineyard-focused characters. The richer malbec fruits are clear here, and at 20% of the blend, it has a role to play, both in terms of the upfront plushness and back palate depth. The old vines are also working some magic within the layers of structure and length here. The palate's immaculate and supple, the tannins are fluid, long and polished, and there's detail here as well as depth, before things culminate in an incredibly fresh finish. Tannins are superbly elegant and truly refined. This is a wine of finesse and fine detail. Beautifully grown, perfectly captured and astutely crafted. This is everything a great wine should be and a new step for Vasse Felix, Margaret River and for Australian cabernet. Drink 2020-2030+.
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Decanter
A new flagship wine celebrating the founder of Vasse Felix, the region's first winery. It is complex, multi-layered and seamless, with gentle blackcurrant aromas and a hint of pepper, followed by a medium-bodied, velvety palate of surprising softness. Ripe, ultra-fine tannins. Drinking Window 2023 - 2042
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
This wine is made with 76% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Malbec and 4% Petit Verdot. It had a 100% wild ferment and 2% carbonic maceration and matured in French oak for 19 months (61% new). The 2013 Cabernet Sauvignon Malbec Tom Cullity was the first of the new flagship Tom Cullity wine, after the cessation of the Heytesbury red. The 2013 vintage, on release and for several years afterward, was a buxom, full, almost vivacious wine that spoke of purple fruits, tobacco leaf and plenty of fleshy tannin. Here, a decade later, the 2013 Tom Cullity has evolved into a savory wine that speaks of lotus leaf, saltbush, nori, enoki mushroom, blackberry, cassis and the telltale raspberry that I often find in the Tom Cullity Cabernet. It's really coming into its own now, and yet it still has more ascension in front of it.
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Wine & Spirits
Virginia Willcock makes this wine from the Vasse Felix Home Vineyard, which Tom Cullity first planted in 1967. This vintage, from a warm summer and a long, cool harvest season, layers gentle, savory tannins and honeyed blue fruit. Focused on cabernet sauvignon (76 percent), with malbec (20 percent) and petit verdot, it’s a young, minty red that needs bottle age to develop, or short ribs to show itself more fully.
Other Vintages
2019-
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Established in 1967 by regional pioneer Dr Tom Cullity, Vasse Felix is Margaret River's founding wine estate. Pristine isolation, ancient lands and twin oceans make Margaret River a wine paradise and one of the world’s greatest environments to grow ultra-premium Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay. These varieties, alongside Shiraz and Semillon Sauvignon Blanc blends are the primary focus at Vasse Felix. All wines are grown in Vasse Felix’s four Margaret River vineyards then vinified and bottled within the modern winery, situated at the Home Vineyard overlooking the Wilyabrup Brook. The Vasse Felix Cellar Door - also located at the Home Vineyard - is renowned. Featuring a tasting room, wine lounge, art gallery, wine museum and one of Australia's most acclaimed restaurants, visitors are welcomed from all around the world, eager for the ultimate Vasse Felix experience.
There are many things that make Vasse Felix the special place it is: the incredible environment and climate of Margaret River, their secure family ownership, their treasured heritage, and their priceless vineyards. But above all, it's the dedication of the entire team to continue Dr Cullity's original aim for Vasse Felix: "to make the best possible wine".
A noble variety bestowed with both power and concentration, Cabernet Sauvignon enjoys success all over the globe, its best examples showing potential to age beautifully for decades. Cabernet Sauvignon flourishes in Bordeaux's Medoc where it is often blended with Merlot and smaller amounts of some combination of Cabernet Franc, Malbecand Petit Verdot. In the Napa Valley, ‘Cab’ is responsible for some of the world’s most prestigious, age-worthy and sought-after “cult” wines. Somm Secret—DNA profiling in 1997 revealed that Cabernet Sauvignon was born from a spontaneous crossing of Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc in 17th century southwest France.
Home to some of Australia’s most elegant and long-lived red and white wines, Margaret River is situated in the farthest reaches of Western Australia. Relatively warm and dry, the region is cooled by breezes from the Indian Ocean. Margaret River takes some inspiration from Bordeaux, producing top-quality Cabernet Sauvignons and Bordeaux Blends with firm structure, mouthwatering acidity, balanced alcohol and notes of herbs and spice. For white wines, refreshing blends of Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon as well as complex, age-worthy Chardonnays are regional specialties.