"Certified organic. Lucas Grigsby is a Bannockburn legend. He has been the viticultural manager for the last 35 years and knows these vineyards like nobody ever has or likely ever will. The wine named in his honour comes from just 0.87-hectres of close-planted vines that were grafted over from Shiraz in 2019. The clone is Bernard 76. Grigsby and Matt Holmes introduced the Bernard clone to Bannockburn to expand the vineyard’s clonal palette, which, in the beginning, was mostly Penfolds clones.
The soils comprise dark, cracking clay over weathered basalt and limestone. The block, originally planted in 2007, houses 1.2-metre rows with 1-metre vine spacing on a north-south row orientation. The wine is whole-bunch pressed, settled overnight and racked to barrels for a wild yeast fermentation in French oak hogsheads; approximately 25% was new oak. Malolactic fermentation occurred naturally on 100% of the blend. The wine was left on lees, unstirred, for 10 months prior to blending and bottling.
Of the three single-vineyard 2024s, Grigsby leans into a slinky, more textural style of Chardonnay. The nose is cool and focused: hints of ripe pear, yellow apple skin, and a touch of salted caramel build with grip and generosity. The site was previously called De la Roche, “of the rock”, and this wine delivers up plenty of rocky, compact structure. Then, there’s a lovely chewiness to the extract which is balanced by saline freshness and underscored by reverberating energy. A complex and layered wine that continues to evolve in the glass."
Distributor Notes