After the unprecedentedly cold and wet 2022-2023 we were interested in what might be in store for this growing season’s turn around the sun. We’ve had a string of cooler and wetter seasons and harvests these last five years, and we’ve been joking with friends that a little El Niño might be a nice treat…

And so it was, we got our little treat – an El Niño year. Its first gift was a severe and fairly peculiar frost in the last week of October, which is the typical week for damaging frosts to hit the Beechworth GI. It was an odd frost though because – and fortunately – no other Stanley vineyard we make wine from was damaged in any way, which is not what you’d expect from a broad advective frost event, which typically clip everyone in the mesoclimate. Thorley however was severely reduced: around two thirds singed off the Chardonnay and Nebbiolo, and half of the Riesling. Curiously, the Syrah was rather unaffected, for which we were grateful.

There was pretty decent rain through much of Spring and early Summer and it looked to be shaping up to be a pretty neutral season, but after new year’s things did dry up properly and remained dry until now (mid-July as this is written). And so, we ended up having a fairly early and quick harvest with reduced cropping levels.

Our altitude means that acids were still quite bright, but we’re also seeing a dialled-up wattage, so to speak in the Beechworth wines due to simple concentration factor. Another unexpected corollary is that our malos (which usually take much of winter to complete) were all complete before the winter solstice. This will mean the racking of the wines occurs some three to four months earlier than usual, and probably bring forward some aspects of their pre-bottling elevage. Most of the 2023 wines in oak completed malolactic fermentation in December 2023 or January 2024. All the 2024 wines in oak are through only six months later – to illustrate this contrast.

Where the 2023 wines are shy, tightly coiled and even perhaps backward, we think the 2024 wines will show a degree of confidence and earlier drinkability for this reason. Looking ahead to when we do release our 2024 wines hough, there will definitely be fewer bottles to snaffle – so you’ll have to be a little quicker to secure your favourites!

~Tess & Jeremy