Our judges were enormously excited when the top wine was revealed as a 2021 Gisborne montepulciano, a glorious endorsement of 2021 in Gisborne and of how well this variety, far from its native Italy, can do in the right hands. It’s a fantastic result from David and Shona Egan who have been grape growers in Gisborne for over 40 years and clearly are not afraid to try something new. In fact, Bushmere came to be when in the mid- 2000s their standing grape-supply contracts were not renewed. Faced with a dilemma, the Egans established their own label and have been growing and making Bushmere wine since 2005. Bushmere is named for the area the vineyard land occupies, as denoted on old maps of the district.

This wine is an intense, deep, ruby colour in the glass with ripe blackberries, cherries and warm spice on the nose. The palate is well weighted with beautiful purity of fruit, succulent and juicy on the mid-palate with modest tannins and a delicious chocolatey finish. A wine that will reward time in the cellar.

With experiments in vine growth that result in wines such as this, we encourage more New Zealand winemakers to branch out from the norm and try something a little bit different. No doubt winemaking is a challenging, 365-day-a- year job and it’s definitely not easy, but results like this show us that anything is possible in this wonderful little island nation at the end of the world.