AVAILABLE 22 MARCH 2024
OPTUME | A MASTERPIECE IN WINE
The 2024 release Optume wines are the ultimate expression of cool climate wines, meticulously handmade and produced without regard to vineyard location, cost or effort. The resulting wine is this Optume: The pinnacle of what we are capable of.
Discover our new release 2021 Optume Chardonnay, 2019 Optume Shiraz, and 2019 Optume Cabernet Sauvignon below.
Our Optume wines embody the sum of our people and of our work, showcasing years of meticulous effort by our winemaker Paul Bridgeman to create a wine expressing the Yarra Valley. We have looked beyond the horizon of our own vineyards to pull together an assemblage of hand-sorted grapes sourced from individual Yarra Valley sites. The combination of terroirs allows for more nuanced flavours and complexity, with the outcome an outstanding new benchmark in wine.
The rarity of these wines results from the pulling together of the strengths and expressions of a small number of select grapes. Each parcel of fruit was expressly designated for predicted contributions they have towards the final blend.
The end result is a masterpiece in wine. Each bottle or limited edition 6 pack case is accompanied by an individually numbered key that unlocks the magnificent contents inside your wine's hand-made timber box.
NEW RELEASE OPTUME WINES
The exceptional 2021 vintage provided ideal conditions for us to follow-up our inaugural 2020 release in presenting an overall expression of Chardonnay provided from multiple sub-regions of the Yarra Valley. Grapes were sourced from seven select vineyard sites dispersed across the central valley floor rising up to the higher, cooler later-ripening upper Yarra to the south. Combining volume, intensity and weight with focus, finesse and restraint, this enticing slow-building fuller-bodied Chardonnay is the meeting of an assemblage of individual strengths and personalities of multiple vineyard sites. It leads with an aromatic intensity of mandarin, pine-lime, Aleppo pepper, fennel pollen, makrut leaf, chamomile, bread dough, spun sugar, crème anglaise and gun smoke with an undercurrent of grapefruit pith, shale and petrichor.
The 2019 vintage provided prime conditions to fashion the third instalment of our Optume Shiraz. Grapes were sourced from select premium sites located across the Yarra Valley with the express intention of creating a classic cool-climate Shiraz of exceptional regional character and typicity. This assemblage of five individual sites combines their intrinsic strengths and expressions to deliver a wine greater than the sum of its parts. This broodingly aromatic and refined Shiraz opens with a complex intensity, walking a tightrope between red and black fruits, loganberry, cranberry, plum compote, white pepper, clove, black limes, aniseed, and olive tapenade.
The 2019 vintage provided ideal conditions to pursue the second instalment of our Optume Cabernet Sauvignon. Grapes were sourced from select premium sites located across the Yarra Valley with the express intention of creating a cool-climate, single-varietal, classic ‘claret’ style of Cabernet Sauvignon of exceptional regional character and typicity. The wine features brooding restrained fruit characters of cassis, bramble, blackberry leaf and dark chocolate with complexing savoury elements of bergamot, bay leaf, sandalwood and leather.