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poured the 1978 Hermitage La Chapelle, and Max Schubert, who served the 1971 Grange (which he singled out as being his ideal vintage; see Huon Hook, WFW 8, pp.50–51); and even a bestselling book by Michel Dovaz, Fine Wines: Best Vintages Since 1900 (Assouline, 2009), where 1961 is represented by Hermitage La Chapelle, and 1962, by Grange. And Grange was, of course, labeled as nothing other than “Grange Hermitage” from the 1950s all the way through to 1989 (Bin 95 Grange tout court from 1990). Gago was always convinced that
the best Penfolds parent wine would be Grange—partly because of all the above associations, and partly because committing the most famous Penfolds wine would be the clearest, if also the riskiest, statement of complete conviction—even if Penfolds RWT Bin 798 might have seemed a contender, since it is matured, like Hermitage La Chapelle, in French rather than American oak. Nevertheless, he wanted to convince the Penfolds team, as well as the Frey team, by staging a tasting of blends using other Penfolds wines. And if he was convinced before the tasting that Grange would be best, he was still more so afterward—as they all were. As he says, “When things are real, all quickly becomes self-evident.” Gago and Frey were equally sure that a 50/50 blend of the two wines would be best—symbolically, in terms of an equal partnership, but also in terms of taste—which also proved to be the case, and which will be the rule from now on. Because the inaugural 2021 vintage is no one-off—not a Penfolds Special Bin, which might be a one-off—but is the first in what is intended to be a long line of annual releases, “Mother Nature permitting.” The 2022 is already in bottle, and the 2023 blended in barrel
Birth and early life However “natural” the marriage, though, the wine’s actual birth inevitably required some intervention from the midwives, because the logistical and practical challenges were considerable. For a start, the two parents—one from the southern hemisphere, one from the northern—were on the scene some six months apart. And the birth needed to be in Australia, because legally it could not be in France. (The wine has on the
60 | THE WORLD OF FINE WINE | ISSUE 87 | 2025
Gago and Frey always envisaged the wine as a celebration of a grape variety and a style, rather than of a particular place or producer. “The blend’s raison d’être: one variety— reunited, reinterpreted, reassembled”
back label, “Wine of France 50%. Wine of Australia 50%.”) Gago and Frey were both keen that the birth happen as soon as possible— but it would still need to be after the Hermitage La Chapelle had been through its malolactic. It was then air-freighted in barrel to Australia, to reduce the risks as far as possible, all the while being very carefully controlled and monitored for oxygen levels and temperature, with which Penfolds’ experience of other cross- continental blends proved beneficial. After the blending, the new wine went back into oak; the time it will spend there will vary with the vintage, but Gago supposes it will normally be between six and nine months. Half of the blend went into American oak that had already been “seasoned” with other Penfolds wine that year, so not completely new, and the other half of the blend into French oak, 15% of which had been seasoned in the same way. The Grange had already been in 100% new American oak, and the La Chapelle in 15% new French oak, so Gago reckons that the overall proportion of new wood is around 70%.
There was then the crucial question of how long the new wine should spend in wood, Gago being convinced that “the bottling date is as important as the picking date.” He therefore sent samples back to the Frey team so that they could decide together. Once the date had been settled, the wine was not fined but went through what Gago calls a very light “sticks and stones” filtration, before being bottled under cork and spending more time in bottle prior to release. (This period may also vary, but Gago thinks it will normally be between 12 and 18 months.)
A challenge of a different kind had
been keeping the marriage and birth a carefully guarded secret over several years, throughout the very detailed and protracted discussions between the two companies, involving the marketing, PR, and sales teams, as well as all of the winemakers. A few wine writers were let in on the secret and had an opportunity to meet the new baby in London in October 2024, during tastings for the ninth edition of Penfolds’ The Rewards of Patience. The official presentation was at a very spectacular dinner at La Monnaie de Paris on February 9, 2025. After the embargo was finally lifted, one of the articles to break the news was written by WFW columnist Nick Ryan, senior wine writer for The Australian, where the story made the front page under the headline, “Like a Beatles–Stones album, this wine marriage is made in heaven.”
Welcoming the wonder child Both of the parent companies were always aware that not everybody would welcome the new baby into the world so warmly. Frey accepted before the launch that “we will attract some criticism—every good new idea is criticized by some people. But I’m not afraid of that. I would be far more worried if we didn’t attract any criticism, which would suggest that the idea isn’t as original, as unique, as we believe it is.” And sure enough, some responded to the news by questioning the wine’s raison d’être (if not quite its right to exist). One UK wine writer (and doubtless others) asked on social media, “Why?” To which an obvious answer (and there are other much more positive ones) would be, “Why not?” After all, it’s not as if either parent wine will be diminished in anything other than quantity, unlike some new special cuvées, where an existing wine is compromised or sacrificed by having its heart and soul—be that derived from a particular lieu-dit or an old-vine parcel—removed. As with all blends— including Grange and Hermitage La Chapelle (the latter mainly now from lieux-dits Le Méal, Les Bessards, and Les Rocoules)—it may well be that the best perspective from which to view the new wine is not that of terroir, even though terroir operates on different levels, and nobody who has been on
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