The fruit for this wine comes entirely from the dry-grown Casuarina Vineyard, planted in 1990. The Casuarina
Vineyard in located on Hermitage Road, only a couple of hundred metres north of our iconic HVD Vineyard. The
sandy, alluvial soils on this site are ideal for growing super-premium whites.
The 2016 growing season was one that started with great promise with our wettest winter in nearly a decade. Perfect
conditions for budburst and flowering were followed by an unsettled summer consisting of hot days and wild storms
until the first week of January, before entering a dry spell that allowed the Chardonnay grapes to reach optimal ripeness
for super-premium sparkling production.
100% Chardonnay fruit. Handpicked on 14 January 2016 and hand sorted in the vineyard. The fruit was then lightly
pressed before primary fermentation in stainless steel at the Tyrrell’s Estate winery. The wine then spent approximately
nine months on gross lees before undergoing tirage bottling on-site at Tyrrell’s winery, by Chief Winemaker Andrew
Spinaze and the winery team in October 2016.
Secondary fermentation took place in the bottle with a specific yeast strain for sparkling, hand selected by our Andrew
Spinaze to give purity, freshness, brightness and complexity to the resulting wine. The wine then spent approximately 8
years on lees before being disgorged in July 2024. The disgorging liquor was house made using aged (23-year-old) Vat
47 Chardonnay stock and a 10-year-old brandy spirit.
The nose is pure and precise, exhibiting elegant floral notes, citrus and a hint of aged complexity from the extended
maturation time on lees before disgorging. The palate also shows the purity of Chardonnay made in a traditional
sparkling style with flavours of green apple, lemon, white peach and brioche.
Alcohol – 12.0%
