Product information

Bindi Original Vineyard Pinot Noir 2020

Pinot Noir from Macedon, Victoria, Australia

$92

$88ea in any 3+
$84ea in any 6+
Closure: Diam

Description

The 2020 Original Vineyard spent 16 months in barrel. This wine comes from our 1988 planting. As always, it’s beautifully fragrant of red fruits, with subtle earthiness and undergrowth giving added complexity. It is definitely expressive Pinot Noir! The palate is supple, juicy, textured, fine and long. The tannin builds and drives whilst remaining silky smooth and elegant. History tells us this wine will improve for at least six more years and drink well beyond that.

Michael D

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Check out all of the wines by Bindi

Why is this Wine so Yummy?

About Bindi

A Bit of Bindi on the Side – An interview with Michael Dhillon of Bindi Wines

It’s great to have someone with as much experience as Michael so clearly articulate what has been a massive period of evolution the Australian wine industry. Particularly on the Pinot front. This is a must watch for any Pinot fanatic!

Michael Dhillon’s been around the block. Mostly Block 5 & a few others that Bindi planted moons ago. After over a generation of growing grapes and making wines, Bindi, has the reputation of one of Australia’s great Pinot and Chardonnay producers. They aren’t resting on their laurels!

New high density planting are in the ground and will soon bare fruit. The ever present desire to achieve the most delicious wine possible still beats stong in his heart.

From Bindi

‘Bindi’, 50 kilometres north-west of Melbourne in the Macedon Ranges, is the family property of the Dhillon family. Originally purchased in the 1950s as part of the larger grazing farm ‘Bundaleer’, ‘Bindi’ is a 170 hectare farm of which 7 hectares are planted to Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. Fifteen hectares are dedicated to managed plantation eucalypts for high grade furniture timber whilst the remainder of the land is maintained as remnant bush land and important indigenous grasslands.

The Bindi vineyard is the fundamental focus of our endeavors. Our vineyard and winemaking philosophy is to seek balance and purity in the expression of our various individual vineyard sites and this philosophy is applied to farming and conservation at ‘Bindi’; the preservation of the natural harmony.

The Bindi labels featured under the link ‘wine styles’ provide some of the stories of people and place that define our endeavour.

In the Vineyard

Vineyard elevation 500 meters above sea level. Soils predominantly shattered quartz over siltstone, sandstone and clay (Ordovician period sub soils-480 million years old) with some eroded volcanic top soil over clay (Approximately four millions years old). Generally infertile.

Production ranges from 1,800-3,000 dozen bottles per vintage

Yields typically 1.5 to 2 tonnes per acre (3.5 to 5.0 tonnes per hectare)

Typical hand management regimes of fastidious small vineyard philosophies are maintained encompassing hand pruning, frequent passes (at least ten passes each vine) though the growing season managing the vertical shoot positioned canopy and hand harvesting

Since 2005 we have been implementing organic procedures and inputs where the focus is on promoting soil life and balance leading to excellent vine health. This involves compost, undervine cultivation and aerating the soil (opening up the soil for air, moisture and soil applications).

Chardonnay plantings – 2 hectares
Kostas Rind Chardonnay in 1988
Quartz Chardonnay in 1988

Pinot Noir plantings – 5 hectares
Original Vineyard Pinot Noir in 1988
Block Five Pinot Noir in 1992
Block K Pinot Noir in 2001
Darshan in 2014 (high density Pinot Noir (11,300 vines per hectare in a 1.1m x 0.8m))
Block 8 in 2016 (high density Pinot Noir (11,300 vines per hectare in a 1.1m x 0.8m))

In the Winery

Our fermentations occur without addition of yeast, yeast nutrient or enzyme.  Unsettled Chardonnay juice goes straight to barrel, reds are gently worked, delicate pressing, long lees ageing in French barrels and minimal racking. No fining and restricted filtration regimes are followed.

Vigneron: Michael Dhillon

Michael was born in the town of Gisborne (where his family on his mother Kaye’s side have been since 1853) , 55kms north west of Melbourne, and grew up at Bindi, a 170 hectare farm just outside the township. Today he and his family produce chardonnay and pinot from their vineyard at Bindi which Bill and Michael Dhillon established in 1988.

Michael served as assistant winemaker to Stuart Anderson from 1991 until 1998 when he assumed full responsibility. Michael learned his craft working with Stuart as well as experiencing vintages in Europe, where he spent time with the Champagne house of Jean Vesselle in Bouzy, with Alain Graillot in Croze-Hermitage and four vintages in Tuscany at Tenuta di Valgiano. During the mid 1990s Michael also worked with John Wade over parts of three vintages when John was establishing Howard Park Winery. Michael’s passion for Burgundy has seen him visit over 100 different domaines over two decades.

The 2020 Vintage at Bindi

The 2020 season, our 30th harvest……60% down in volume!

The ride was long and radical. When we thought ‘this season has had it all’ it gave some more, and what more it gave! Well, more extreme challenges for much less wine.

The early winter rains were a blessing and the soil saturated and the dams overflowed, as did our level of satisfaction. Then things dried out. Spring was dramatically dry and cold and then turned nastily windy, hot and dry. The countryside suffered. With the dry and cold of early spring came frightening freezes and hard frosts that damaged the new shoots. Here we go we said. The fruit set was disrupted by winds and wildly swinging weather and the crop was further reduced. The summer was so severe, the countryside so vulnerable, the mood was glum and our concerns went well beyond our own crops. Our colleagues and country folk and the fauna and flora of many states were scorched and tormented by smoke and fire in unimaginable ways.

Then things turned, and then they turned again.

From the middle of summer, the middle of January, the rains came. The mild weather made for smiles for the season, brows softened and stock was taken. The vines took this relief and freshened as the countryside flourished a remarkable green brightness. The mushrooms sprang and the fragile crop and rebounding vines suddenly became a concern; humidity, spores and mould, delays in ripening, where was it all headed? The maturity of the fruit was slow and long, ambling past March into the fast fracturing of health and economy as we moved from the burning summer, then the rains, to the shutdown of the pandemic. Unimaginable.

So, starting early April, under the umbrella of distancing, the careful crop clipping and wary winery work went on and the crop came in. This fruit that carries these remarkable twists and turns, barely half a crop, ferments calmly done in isolation, save for some careful tending by a skeleton crew cautious of becoming so. Twenty 20 was a challenge and the wines are a blessing to have. Some are beautifully harmonious and well structured, others more elegant and fine boned. With the deep and powerful 2019s and 2021s bracketing them the 2020s are clearly lighter and will take a couple of years to build and fill out. They are certainly delicious, some much more than, but really, it was a season that was hardly 20/20!

Where in the World is Bindi Wines?

Bindi is in Gisbourne within the Macedon Ranges, one of Victoria’s cool climate wine regions. Look to the north and a little west of Melbourne.

Click to enlarge 🔎

Where in the world does the magic happen?

Bindi Wines, Gisborne-Melton Rd, Gisborne VIC, Australia

Macedon
Victoria
Australia