NZ producer Jackson Estate opens new Pinot Noir winery

New Zealand wine producer Jackson Estate has officially opened its new Pinot Noir winery, as well as a cellar door that was designed by the art director of blockbuster, The Hobbit.

[Copyright: Scott Fitzgerald, Fairfax NZ]The Marlborough wine producer, which was established by John Stichbury nearly 30 years ago, officially opened the new winery on Friday, although it became operational two months ago for the 2017 vintage. The winery also includes a Cellar Door, which was designed by the art director of The Hobbit, Brian Massey. The new shop has been designed to look like an original 1850’s homestead wrapped around the modern winery, according to New Zealand media outlet www.Stuff.co.nz.

Speaking to db last autumn, Jackson Estate winemaker Matt Patterson-Green said the project, which has been in planning for around four years, was an exciting undertaking which would give the company “compete and utter control” of these wines.

The new winery, which has a capacity of just over 250 Tonnes, with 52 tanks and will concentrate on the estate’s top end Pinot Noir, will enable the estate to have greater control of its premium small-batch wines, he said.

Jackson Estate previously worked with two contract winemaking facilities using its own equipment on its Pinot Noir production in their barrel hall, but Patterson-Green said moving to its own Pinot Noir production would allow the estate to have “hands-on control of the top 10%” of its wines.

“The [contact] wineries specialise in Sauvignon Blanc, they do it so well that it wouldn’t be economic to [change] it… But it is worth it for the Pinot Noir.”

“We aren’t using a lot of tech – we have warming and cooling, hand-plunging, manually filling barrels, it’s the side we like doing. That’s where you learn the soul of your wines – you can’t learn it behind a desk,” he said.

The plan was to work with one or two labels and also undertake contract winemaking at the new winery, Patterson-Green added. “We have the ability to do 5,000 cases, but we are only making 2,000 cases because we only what we know we can harvest and sell. We don’t make a surplus.”

There was, he added, a “noticeable increase” in Pinot Noir sales to the UK, which had been growing steadily.

The estate has vineyards in Jackson Road planted with Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Riesling and Pinot Noir, and two in in Marlborough’s Southern Valley sub-region, the Waihopai Valley, Eversley and Somerset, planted with Pinot Noir and Sauvignon Blanc.

It produces a range of wines, including Stich 2015 Sauvignon Blanc, a barrique Sauvignon Blanc, Grey Ghost 2012, Chardonnay and dry Riesling, and five Pinot Noirs, including Vintage Widow 2011, Gum Emperor Single Vineyard 2011.

The estate refocused the business several years ago to concentrate on its top end wines.

“After 2008, we realised our differentiation in the market and pulled back from what we were doing and concentrated on growing sensibly, not through volumes or discounting,” Patterson-Green said.