2023 PIERRO CHARDONNAY
En Primeur
This is an exclusive opportunity to secure your yearly allocation of the 2023 Pierro chardonnay prior to international release (en primeur) at the lowest price available. Once the en primeur allocation has been exhausted no further sales of the 2023 Pierro Chardonnay will be available for sale online and the price of the wine will rise significantly when it is released nationally. The price of the en primeur offer is restricted to 6/12 bottle boxes to reward loyal supporters of Pierro Chardonnay who purchase boxes in advance whilst the wine is still maturing.
This wine will be posted in the first week of October from our cellar in Margaret River. Please allow 10 days for the wine to arrive. We appreciate you purchasing directly from our cellar to yours.
Vintage 2023
A cold winter and spring followed by a mild dry summer resulting in a gentle, consistent ripening across all varieties. Vintage for this wine commenced on the 14th of February and completed on the 23rd of March after 9 seperate picks. Ray jordan has noted 'In the case of the '23s from WA, I don't think I have seen wines of so much vibrance, life and energy, with such expressive fruit' All of the fruit for the Pierro chardonnay is hand picked, chilled to five degrees and then bunch sorted by hand prior to whole bunch pressing using a sparkling press cycle. Fermented and matured in French oak barriques for 12 months (44% new) with fortnightly battonage.
History
In the words of Jeremy Oliver, “Pierro is one of the few Australian wineries that could claim to have established a trend that many others have followed. Since the mid 1980’s Mike Peterkin has crafted a Chardonnay of not only monumental power, but of simultaneously smooth and silky delivery”. The Pierro ‘style’ was first made in 1986 and refined with every subsequent vintage. Mike had initially intended to specialise in Riesling on his Willyabrup plot, so it was a tad fortuitous that Chardonnay became Pierro's most famous wine. His vine supplier had been let down on a large order of Chardonnay rootstock, approximately 5000 cuttings, and offered them to Mike at a cut price. In order to help out his friend he agreed to take them. It was an inspired decision. Today the Pierro is regarded as one of the finest Chardonnays in the region. Seeing as Margaret River is indisputably Australia!s premier Chardonnay producing region, this is a major honour.
Vineyard
Today there are five distinct blocks of Chardonnay on the property in Willyabrup, with the average vine age reaching 30 years. 90% of the Pierro Chardonnay is the Gin-Gin clone which has proven itself to produce the best quality wine and one that has been particularly successful in Margaret River. Each block features unique high-density narrow rows on rocky soil that slope down to the Willyabrup Brook and are orientated to the west and north. The vineyards are managed to maximise fruit, leaf and cane exposure to sunlight; minimise wind damage in the spring and to heighten flavour development in the summer ripening period.
Winemaking
Each parcel is hand-picked, chilled, hand-sorted and gently whole bunch pressed. There are multiple picks for this wine. With the first batches being picked for aromatic complexity and acidity and the latter picked for flavour and body. All juice is settled and then fermented in French barriques. The wine goes through a full malolactic fermentation which helps achieve superior texture, mouth feel and a more refined, persistent flavour. Lees are stirred fortnightly by hand in barrel over a period of 12 months prior to blending, settling and bottling. The result is a world class white which is well entrenched in the top Chardonnay’s of Australia.
Tasting Notes
This is a wine of great finesse yet impressive power, tight structure yet generosity of flavour. Ripe melony, peachy characters yet noticeable restraint and subtlety. An unctuous mouth-feel yet with taut, fine acidity on the finish. It will start to be at its best about June 2024 and will continue to mature gracefully for another 10 years. An ideal accompaniment to seafood and white meat dishes. Ideal cellaring temperature is a constant 14-16 degrees celsius.
Favoured Listening
Delibes’ Flower Duet
Harmony; delicate elegance balanced perfectly with richness, depth and hidden power. Long lingering finish that leaves one feeling delightfully pensive and soothed.
2023 Pierro Chardonnay
"This will sit alongside anything Peterkin has made in more than four decades as one of the finest winemakers in the region. It is a cracking good wine delivered with precision and power with a degree of delicacy and finesse that makes it so appealing. Incredible intensity on the nose with aromas of white peach and grapefruit with a little muted butterscotch in the background. The palate is powerful and drives with urgency through to a remarkably long finish. The oak is neatly interlaced, and the fresh acidity adds another dimension with its savoury chalky character."
'White Wine of the Year'
98/100 - Ray Jordan - WA Wine Review 2025
2023 Pierro Chardonnay
Pierro Chardonnay be what Pierro Chardonnay be. But there’s a smidgen more finesse in this year’s release and, combined with Pierre’s trademark fruit power, the effect is quite the sensational. Pierro is one of the original (as in, it was the first) close-planted blocks in Margaret River, at 6000 vines per hectare.
Power up front; finesse through the finish. This makes well and truly sure that it has your attention and then it shows that it has both depth, and style. Pears, yellow peaches, grilled nuts and a creamy, smoky, nougat character. There’s an element of quartz to this wine, or of something stony, and it’s a part of its glory. This is a noted wine in noteworthy form. It finishes long. It’s compelling throughout.
96/100 - Campbell Mattinson - The Wine Front
2022 Pierro Chardonnay
Another sensational Peterkin chardonnay that displays the winery and vineyard DNA of richness and texture. It's a powerful statement from this vintage which produced fruit of great intensity. It shows on the palate, but then the use of oak holds it in, and the crunchy, slightly chalky cracked seashell acidity brings it even closer. Very long palate is keenly defined. A beauty.
98/100 - Ray Jordan - WA Wine Review 2024
2022 Pierro Chardonnay
According to Pierro’s website, the music to play while tasting this wine is Delibes’ Flower duet from the opera Lakmé, described, in part, as “balanced perfectly with richness, depth and hidden power. Long lingering finish that leaves one feeling delightfully pensive and soothed.” Reads like a tasting note for the wine. Yet who sings the duet is important – my favourite recording is the incomparable Dame Joan Sutherland and Jane Berbié. Like the Dame, this wine is powerful, rich and precise. It’s full-bodied and layered with ripe stone fruit, nutty, creamy lees and spicy oak, and yet, the super-tight acid line seems to corral all those overt flavours into submission driving to a long, resounding finish while allowing moreish, savoury aspects to rise – lemon-lime freshness cleansing the palate. Impressive.
95/100 - Jane Faulkner - Halliday Wine Companion
2022 Pierro Chardonnay
Wonderful to lift such a lightweight bottle!
Peach, pear and fennel, spiced butter cashews, flinty top note, a little saline with it.Lively acidity and chalky dusty texture, creamy with some tropical accents, and a lime-laced finish of excellent length. Such regal carriage and delivery of bold Chardonnay flavour.
95/100 - Gary Walsh - The Wine Front
2022 Pierro Chardonnay
The 2022 Chardonnay is rich and nutty, with a smooth/polished/glossy flow of fruit and phenolics that seem to rush across the palate as one. Refined and satisfying, the Pierro Chardonnay is infallibly consistent, and it's a remarkable wine year on year. This warm 2022 season yielded painfully little Chardonnay volumes in Margaret River, and perhaps even more annoyingly, the wines are really good, as this is. There are notes of salted pistachios, yellow peach, blonde tobacco, red apple skins, scratched citrus, caper brine... I love it.
95/100 - Erin Larkin - The Wine Advocate
2021 Pierro Chardonnay
Hailing from one of the most scenic wine regions in the world where earth and water collide, this Margaret River chardonnay sits in the top handful of producers. Most Margaret River chardonnays are based on the Gin Gin clone which is thought to trace its origins back to Meursault.
It’s a decadently styled wine with alluring aromas of brioche, button mushrooms, golden delicious apples and cigarbox spice. On the palate, intense flavours wash across—honeyed stone fruits, freshly baked sourdough and crème patissière are tailed by saline flavours that delight. Year after year, it’s clear that this is not only one of Margaret River’s best wines but also Australia’s.
96/100 - Gabrielle Poy - The Real Review
2021 Pierro Chardonnay
"Cooler season has resulted in this distinctly linear almost Burgundy-like expression of Margaret River Chardonnay. It's one of the tightest Pierro Chardonnays that I can recall, but I suspect it will age to reveal some of those beautiful vineyard qualities. Chalky minerality with a little butterscotch and sauvery notes turning the screws to tighten a focussed finish. Beautifully integrated palate."
97/100 - Ray Jordan - WA Wine Review 2023
2020 Pierro Chardonnay
SIMPLY STUNNING
"The intensity of this super chardonnay was evident the moment I screwed the top off. Wow. This captures so much of the character of this excellent, small Margaret River vintage. It’s delicate, yet it has so much power driving through the palate. Butterscotch and white peach with an edge of nectarine work in harmony. The oak treatment is excellent, providing such control. Mike Peterkin has been making great chardonnay for years, but this one might just be the best yet. "
98/100 - Ray Jordan - The West Australian2020 Pierro Chardonnay
"I’d say the best Margaret River Chardonnay wines combine richness of flavour and power, with fresh acidity. Well, that’s what you have here. All the stone fruit, ripe pear, nougat, hazelnut and spice, with subtle struck match, and maybe a sizzle of grapefruit. It has a slippery glycerol feel, but pulls tight and flinty, a spiced honey biscuit thing happening too, oatmeal, and a crisp long finish of superb length. Lovely. Powerful, But kind of calm too. And soothing."
96/100 - Gary Walsh - The Wine Front
“Pierro chardonnay is one of my go-to recommendations for 'fine' examples of Australian chardonnay, mostly unswerving in its personality, expression of the grape, power and presence in the glass.”
Mike Bennie - The Wine Front“Pierro chardonnay is the role model for so many of Australia’s more opulent and hedonistically proportioned chardonnays and is a stunning expression of Margaret River Chardonnay”
Jeremy Oliver