PAXTON 2022 AGRILLA SYRAH

A limited-release wine, the amphora-aged Argilla Syrah comes from fruit sourced from vines originally planted in 1887 at our Thomas Block vineyard, which is renowned for producing fruit of exceptional flavor and natural balance. These vines are amongst the oldest in McLaren Vale and are carefully hand-pruned and thinned to ensure the low and uniform yields required for super premium Shiraz.

Vintage Notes

Well, you thought 2021 was good but I bet you hadn’t heard about 2022 yet! With most of the country experiencing extreme La Niña conditions, in McLaren Vale we were hit with the lucky stick and enjoyed plenty of soil-moistening rain through the winter but no extreme events. Budburst was a breath of new life after a long cool Winter and conditions were ideal up to flowering where things went a bit haywire. Crazy Melbourne-type weather blew a lot of the flowers away before they could turn into fruit… but less fruit, more quality, and coming off a bumper 2021 vintage it helped balance things out. We had a lovely cool summer, which helped ripening happen nice and slow, just the way we like it. Vintage was well spread out with fine days through most of March allowing us to choose when to pick and preserve stunning, natural acidity.

Color: Blood of Jupiter

Bouquet

Terrestrial, wild rosemary, sweet peas, and wet limestone. It’s like you can imagine the clay squelching through your hands in a pottery class on a cliff by the thrashing ocean below.

Palate

Ethereal, tight but generous, tannins like moon dust that speak of a far-flung place disappearing into the starry night punctuated by colorful swirls far out in the cosmos. Omnipresence enveloped by a cloud.

Vinification

A new adventure for Paxton Wines with a beautiful amphora in the foothills around Florence, Italy. The fruit from the ancient vines was hand-picked on a fruit day and partially destemmed and partially left as whole bunches into the amphora for a natural fermentation with no added yeast or any other products. The wine spent 41 days on skins with delicate hand plunges throughout the fermentation and was then gently basket pressed on a descending moon and put straight back into the amphora for a further six months before bottling with minimal sulfites.

Alcohol: 14.0%

Winemaker: Ashleigh Seymour

Peak Drinking: GOOD: Now - BETTER: Winter 2024 - KEEP: 2026