Howard Park Scotsdale Shiraz 2018 x 6
Product Description
2018 Howard Park
Scotsdale Shiraz
www.howardparkwines.com.au | hpw@hpw.com.au
Distinguished Sites
Shiraz from the Frankland River & Mount Barker sub-regions of the Great
Southern are blended to highlight the distinctive varietal and regional qualities
of our best sites.
The expression of Shiraz from these cool, continental climates is characterised
by an intensity & concentration of dark fruits with traces of spice, earth and
guiding tannins.
TASTING NOTES
Garnet in colour. A dark and opulent expression of cool climate Shiraz.
The palate has dark plum, cherry, coffee ground flavours, nutmeg and soft
spice and distinctive gravel characteristics from the ancient lateritic soils of
our Scotsdale vineyard. This is a powerful and fullbodied wine, shaped by
18months maturation in a range of French oak barrels, adding flavour and
texture. Evocative yet poised in structure; this is a dark and opulent expression
of Great Southern Shiraz.
VINTAGE
The 2018 growing season saw a return to weather conditions more favourable
and typical of the past decade in the south west of Western Australia.
Our Margaret River vintage commenced on 19th February with Chardonnay
and concluded with Cabernet Sauvignon on 19th April. Good winter rains
were followed by a temperate spring, then a moderate to warm summer - a
textbook progression of seasons for the ideal vintage.
With veraison came the native marri blossom and a sigh of relief that the
annual joust with the native resident birds would be a minor battle not a major
war. As autumn progressed, conditions remained fine. Yields were moderate
across all varieties and full ripeness and flavour development, concurrent.
The early quality assessment of the 2018 vintage is excellent. White wines are
exhibiting very pure and focused varietal notes while the reds show ripe berry
flavours and supple tannins.
VINEYARDS
The wine was blended from a selection of the best batches of Shiraz grown
on our vineyards in Frankland River and Mount Barker. Soils in this area are
lateritic gravels over sandy, clay loam.
WINEMAKING
Small parcels were hand-picked and hand sorted to remove any unwanted
material before fermentation. Fermentation occurred in open vat and closed
stainless steel fermenters. Select parcels of wine were run to barrel between
2 & 3º Baume to capture new barrel characters from the final degrees of
fermentation. The remaining blocks were pressed at dryness to retain fruit
vibrancy. Each batch was matured separately in order to build a wine history
over time. The wine was matured for 18 months in new (~ 25%) and older
French oak barriques, hogsheads and puncheons. After blending to tank the
wine was lightly fined and filtered prior to bottling.
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