Region: Margaret River, Western Australia, Australia
Grapes: Chardonnay
Alcohol: 13.5%
Website: https://leeuwinestate.com.au/
Family owned, Leeuwin Estate, one of the five founding wineries of the now famous Margaret River district of Western Australia, is under the direction of two generations who work with a team of highly skilled winemakers to consistently produce wines ranking alongside the world’s finest. In 1972, legendary Napa Valley winemaker, Robert Mondavi, identified the future site of the Leeuwin vineyard as being ideal for the production of premium wine and provided early mentorship to Denis and Tricia Horgan in the transformation of their cattle farm into Leeuwin Estate. Enjoying its first commercial vintage in 1979, Leeuwin was thrust into the international spotlight when Decanter Magazine gave its highest recommendation to the 1981 “Art Series” Chardonnay.
The international accolades have continued and Leeuwin now exports to 30 markets. The prestigious Langton’s Classification of Australian wine includes Leeuwin Estate Art Series Chardonnay in the top “Exceptional” category and amongst the iconic “Heritage five” celebrating Australia’s most exceptional, ground-breaking wines, whilst Art Series Cabernet Sauvignon is classified as “Outstanding”. Leeuwin Estate has been included in US ‘Wine & Spirits’ Magazine’s Hall of Fame in the category of ‘International Wineries of the Year’ and with point scores as high as 98/100, US ‘Wine Spectator’ has included Leeuwin Art Series Chardonnays amongst the “Top 100 Wines of the Year” on numerous occasions. Leeuwin Estate’s Art Series Cabernet Sauvignon has been a UK ‘Decanter’ Magazine “Top 50 Wine of the Year” and a US ‘Wine & Spirits’ “Top 100 Wine of The Year”, whilst leading Australian wine commentator, James Halliday, includes Leeuwin in his ‘Top 100 Australian Wineries’.
Celebrating the combination of fine wine, food, art and music, Leeuwin features an award winning restaurant, cellardoor and art gallery. The Estate is renowned for staging spectacular events and welcoming visitors from around the world.
Wine Advocate 97+ pts：
The 2021 Art Series Chardonnay leads with a distinctly floral nose: jasmine and white garden rose, wisteria and lemon blossom. The season was a challenging one in Margaret River, defined by the rainfall, which was constant. The temperatures were modest (not cool, as plenty of rain might suggest),and given that the region is so diverse in terms of distances between vineyard areas, this created quite a patchwork of outcomes for producers. On the palate, the wine is powerful and savory—it leans heavily on exotic dry spice and cracked honeycomb, with hints of salted butter on fresh white bread, beeswax and salted pink grapefruit. Stylistically, it is not dissimilar to the 2017; however, the dovetailing of acid and fruit feels seamless and well matched here. The wine is piercing and structural, tightly coiled and almost rigid, in the best of ways. It's an impressive wine, one that, at this stage of its life, is defined by its penetrating acid line. Sealed under screw cap.
