Tim's Ravings

A bottle of wine from a single vineyard is truly rare and special.

All year, year after year, vines are rooted to the one spot, growing and ripening their fruit amid sometimes dramatic climate changes. This year it’s floods, last year it was drought.

The vigneron requires discipline and experience to be able to react to the unique rhythm each growing year offers.

Traditionally the best wines in the world have come from a single vineyard. Over centuries, Burgundy and Bordeaux in France, and Tuscany and Barolo in Italy, have built their reputations on such a premise. Generations of vignerons have each accumulated small pieces of knowledge that add up to the sum of a great wine.

Knowing that the final wine must be made from this one patch of vines is a great discipline on a vigneron. There is no easy option of blending from other vineyards or even districts for this would surely dismantle the complexity and personality of the wine.

It’s like children from the same parents - the DNA is the same for each and defines underlying traits, but it is a curiosity that each has its own complex personality that has been layered by personal experiences both good and bad.

Wine should not be the product of a factory. At Huntington and other committed Estates, wine is craft and science carefully weighed, the bottle is reflective of the toils of vines and vignerons, and the varying weather conditions they have conquered.

I would urge you to hunt down these single vineyard wines, and enjoy the rare complexity offered by each hand-crafted bottle.