$69.99
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Region: Eden Valley
Grapes: Grenache
First Glance: Red Currant, Mineral Edge, Dried Herbs, Blood Orange
Acclaim: 97pts
The Review:
Campbell Mattinson, The Wine Front - 97pts
"Glen’s Vineyard Grenache is from the Eden Valley. Specifically, it’s from the Stonegarten Vineyard, established in 1857. It spent zero time in oak; it’s main winemaking details are these: “28 Days on skins pre-ferment, 8 day ferment, 36 days on skins post ferment. 178 days in a sandstone amphora.” The details only ever matter after the wines have been tasted. Mathematics is an ugly thing, right up to the point where it’s beautiful. This is not mathematics but just these numbers and these details are beautiful, courtesy of the line of sight they provide. This is grenache, seen. This is not just winemaking, it’s wine caring.
It can take a long time for the right person to walk into the right place, but when Mark Bulman, infused with the confidence of a Jimmy Watson grenache win, stepped onto the Stonegarten Vineyard with a mind to make a mark under his own name, various cogs in the universe shifted, and something important slipped into place. If Stonegarten was called Skywalker, I’d say that this vineyard has finally met its father, though in this case, I’ll settle for its maker. This is simply an exquisite wine. My first reaction, in all honesty, was that it’s completely different to anything I’ve seen previously from the Eden Valley. And yet, the longer I sat with it, the more Eden Valley it seemed. This wine sets sail for eden, as a concept, and then returns to Eden, as its home. It throws characters of stone, concrete, redcurrant, blood orange, mint, rust, seaweed and assorted other shopping list items, but it’s the flamboyance of its scent, the long raking farmland of tannin, and the collection of blood-splattered stones that really set it in its place. Yes, I think it’s good."
