EVOLUTION OF A WORK OF ART
Wines have been made for centuries. To appreciate wines, one must differentiate between those that are technically proficient, and those that are works of art. In the latter case, the wine maker applies his or her passion in controlling the interplay between alchemy and continuous transmutation. In the process, 1837 BAROSSA wines achieves its aspiration to be great art.
AUTUMN (March to May): The origination of the wine
Autumn is an eventful season for vintners and wine makers. Everything and everyone is getting ready for the birth of a new wine, with the finest quality grapes as its foundation. Barossa Valley is renowned for its climate, which fosters a natural yield regulation. This reduces the grape mass, which allows for the fruit to develop distinctive and highly expressive aromas that are the hallmark of 1837 BAROSSA. One important criterion for the quality of any wine is the determination of the correct grape harvesting date. For this reason, both wine maker and grape grower walk through the 1837 BAROSSA vineyards day-by-day, analysing and probing the fruit over and again in the long, warm maturation period of 1837 BAROSSA, until they find the perfect date for the grape harvest. When acidity, sugar content and tannins have reached their optimal balance, and the grapes have developed physiological maturity, then the wine maker determines the harvest date.
Thereafter, the air grows thick at 1837 BAROSSA. The gentle scent of open fermentation can be smelled everywhere, and the buzz of activity is felt everywhere around the wine estate. First the grapes are gently de-stemmed and sorted, so that the first stage of vinification can transpire with the grape skins, in open fermentation at 23ºC over seven days. In the process, valuable phenols and tannins are unlocked from the grape skins. The grape must is punched and stirred by hand, three times a day. Thereafter, the malolactic fermentation – also referred to as biological acid breakdown – continues in a closed environment.
Each part of the grape harvest is individually handled and stored in batches, according to the distinct harvest date and the precise origin on our wine estate. Each one of our vineyards has fine differences: for instance, the morning sun predominates in one vineyard, while the water in another vineyard seeps away slightly faster, due to a slightly elevated proportion of rock content in the soil. In other words, each of our seven vineyards has its own character. Fine differences in the terroir that the wine maker must know how to utilize: customised vinification allows for the production of a wine that is absolutely top of the mark.
Basket pressing is a time-honoured classic method that we use on our grapes; it is a particularly gentle style of pressing. After the wine is pressed, it is stored in French oak barrels for more than one year. We use 1–5 year-old French oak barrels, charred (or “toasted”) to a moderate strength, with a 300 litre capacity. This enables us to produce a grand wine that certainly benefits from maturation in the oak barrel, but nevertheless can fully unfold its own aroma without being dominated by the residue of the oak.
WINTER (June–August): The birth of the new vintage
During the mild winters, as the olive and then lemon harvests begin at 1837 BAROSSA, our wines are stabilising in a brisk exchange of air and oak. During this period, the wine makers sample each batch separately, and conduct repeated tests to determine which batches can best coexist with each other in harmony. During the first maturation period in the winter, the wine changes the oak barrel for the first time, which can be considered to be the birth of the new vintage.
SPRING AND SUMMER (September to February): The opus is created
In the little park at 1837 BAROSSA, the flowers start to bloom while in the cellars, maturation continues. The wine changes the oak barrel for the second time in the spring. In the summer, as apricots and plums ripen outside, the wine changes the oak barrel once again, whereupon the third storage period begins, allowing the wine to attain the final maturation. After a lon time in French oak, our wines have achieved its first great maturity.
Until this point in time, each batch and each blend is matured individually. Then, the best batches are chosen for our Iconic Selctions. Next comes the great moment for the wine maker: the completion of the “marriage”, or the merging, of the individual batches. Depending on development, batches are married in the spring or summer of the subsequent year. Like a child who has reached adulthood, each of the selected batches has developed its own personality and character. Now they must be put together with the utmost care. This separates the artist from the technicians. With marriage of some of our wines, such as the Black Label President’s Reserve, as the final brushstroke, the wine maker has completed a great painting, and the grand assemblage of a 1837 Barossa Wine has come into being.
Due to the meticulous individual stages of the maturation process, our wines require neither fining nor filtering; thus, the full aroma of our terroir remains intact in this grand wine. Each bottle is filled in Barossa Valley.
Our iconic wines need the first 6 months in the bottle, in order to rest after the change from oak barrel to bottle. After this rest period, our iconic wines becomes more refined with each year. In the bottle, our wines mature to an even greater wine whose diversity of complex flavour combinations are the reward to those who are patient.