Welcome to Wrights Vineyard & Winery
Cellar Door Opening Hours
We are now open 7 days, from 1.30 - 4.30pm in January. This includes Queens Birthday Weekend, outside our opening hours we welcome appointments.
We have splashed out and purchased some nice chairs and umbrellas, we even have a sand pit for the kids, so feel free to bring a picnic and enjoy our beautiful valley.
If you are interested in visiting us, outside these hours, we would love to see you. Just call us to make a time - (06) 862 5335, 027 656 8222. Our address is 232 Ormond Valley Road, Ormond, Gisborne. We have a small map on our contact page to help.
A great chance to meet us in person, and see our vineyards. Here how we manage our vineyards organically and biodynamically. We look forward to seeing you. There is no tasting charge.
Wine Gift Boxes
This is a great gift for someone special, family or client. We have obtained these lovely wooden boxes, presentation is lovely. The Gift Boxes deal is purchase two bottles of our wine (reserve add $10 per bottle) for $55.
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For those that don't wish to give wine, we can do two bottles of our Verjuice (750ml) instead of wine. If you have a date you want to specify delivery we can do this as well.
Our wines can be ordered direct from us (through this web site, at 'Online Orders' tab), freight free, delivered to your door, anywhere in New Zealand
Wrights Entity Methode Traditinnelle 2010.
Great news we have now released our long awaited Entity Methode Traditionnelle 2010, bottle fermented and traditionally hand riddled. This wine was the focus of the recently aired Country Calendar Show on our vineyard, wines and lives.
We are very excited with the 2010 Methode, grown from our organic grapes and certified organic (conversion). The only New Zealand made, organic certified Methode on the market. This is a fantastic drop – a balanced, elegant wine with a
crisp palate, fine bead and creamy textured finish. Lifted citrus and floral aromatic notes.
We have a stunning new artwork on our new label. Local artist Michael Burt has produced an abstract work of our Terrace Vineyard. Celebrating the bio-diversity of our vineyards and helping to create balance and a harmonious existence of life.
The following wines are still available from us - Wrights Reserve Gewurztraminer, Wrights Gewurztraminer, Wrights Reserve Chardonnay, Wrights Chardonnay, and Entity Methode Traditionnelle 2010.
Country Calendar, Saturday 25th June, TV1, 7pm
We were featured on national television, on the 25th June. Katherine Edmond and her crew filmed our Methode Traditionnelle wine making process, sustainable practices and family. A great chance to learn more about our philosophy and find out more about us. If you missed the show, it can ve viewed at TV1 NZ web site on demand. Here is the web link to view - Country Calendar Online Video Link.
Preservative Free Wine
The 2011 vintage saw us look at making NZ's first preservative free wine to the market. Our customers often ask us for this, so we thought we would deliver.
We recently ran the final wine trial for this preservative free wine. However were not happy with the finished product. So sorry to say, we will not be releasing a preservative free wine this year. However we will not give up on this and will try again with a different approach in mind for the 2012 vintage.
Recent Wine Reviews
This is the wine review of our Wrights Reserve Gewurztraminer 2011 by John Bartlett, Director and Owner of New Zealand Wine Directory, 9th November 2011.
“Tonight Glenys and I opened the bottle of Wrights 2011 Reserve Gewurztraminer and what a stunner it is! Wrights are certified organic so grow their grapes & handcraft their wines using ethical and environmentally friendly, biodynamic techniques. The 2011 Gewurtraminer was made in two batches with the second left on the vines and picked later producing some botrytised fruit. This was barrel-aged for 6 months then blended together to result in this amazing Gertz!
On pouring it showed bright & deep gold in colour, and on the nose “Intoxicating & heady” said Glenys. There is rose petal, Turkish delight & a hint of burnt toffee leading into intense marmalade and stone fruit, ginger and more toffee on the palate with great length & moreish finish.
This really is a complex and textured wine which is drinking beautifully even at such an early age but with a little more time I’d expect that it can only get better. Although we tasted (i.e. drank) this without food it has such depth and concentration that it would be a perfect match for Thai or other similar spicy foods.”
Michael Cooper, recently reviewed two of our wines, this is what he said -
Wrights Gisborne Gewurztraminer 2010
"Grown in the Ormond Valley and partly barrel-fermented, this is richly perfumed wine with a spicy, exotic bouquet. Mout
hfilling and dry, it has concentrated, peachy, gingery flavours, showing excellent complexity and depth. Drink now or cellar." 4/5 stars.
Wrights Reserve Gisborne Chardonnay 2010
"From an Ormond Valley site under conversion to organic, this softly mouthfilling wine shows good concentration of ripe, stonefruit flavours, oak complexity and a slightly buttery, smooth finish. Already drinking well, it's a generous wine, rich, ripe and rounded." 4/5 stars.
Country Calendar and Alison Gofton
March was a busy month for us, with Country Calendar filming us for this season series, visiting us for three days. Great opportunity for us and it was great people to work with. I personnally think our kids will be the star of the show.
Alison Gofton and her crew, visited us, as we are lucky to be picked to be included in her upcoming cook book in August 2011 release. Nicola - now known as 'Top Chef', cooked up a storm in our 9 by 3 metre shack we live in at present, with our two kids. They will be publishing some of Nicola's recipes with our Olive OIl, Verjuice and Wine. A fun day was had, even though the weather was not great. Again our kids will probably feature in the book more than us.
The Gisborne Herald on the 14th February visited our vineyard and did a story on the seasons first pick of grapes - our verjuice.
This story an be viewed on You Tube at Video Clip Gisborne Herald - 2011 Seasons First Pick Grapes. Or just visit Gisborne Herald at www.gisborneherald.co.nz
We have been busy working on new outlets around the country for our customers. Check out our outlets area for an updated list of our current stores around the country. Don't forget though, you can still order direct from us.
To keep in contact with us and up to date with our wine releases, you can subscribe to our bi-monthly newsletter, on the left of this page, just enter in your email address and click on 'Submit'.
For those that did not know, we manage our vineyards organically by using biodynamic techniques. Our vineyards are AsureQuality certified. At present we manage 30 acres, covering two vineyards.
The Joys of Building
We thought we would share with you some of our stories about building our straw bale home, which has now been going for 9 months.
We first started this project with turning the soil over just before xmas 2010. At the same time we sold our house in town and moved in to our rental Highlander Cabin (9 by 2.5 metres) – aka The Rent A Shack – 2 kids, 1 cat (Chardonnay Potammus) and 3 goldfish.
The concrete pad was poured on my birthday, late January. Man I was excited about this. The concrete was being pumped on by a concrete pump, reaching 30 metres into the air. The trucks started coming at 7.30am, truck after truck. Then I saw the contractor shake his head at me and they started lifting the mesh off the floor, using spades to spread out concrete. Meanwhile truck after truck was coming. Challenge number 1 – the polystyerene was lifting at the edges from the pressure of the concrete. Outcome – the concrete contractor downed tools, until the builder had fixed this up. Take 2 – another week later with extra concrete and hireage costs!!!
Challenge number 2 – the builder goes missing for 3 months. Outcome – all scheduled time frames are missed and no roof on.
Finally, roof framing up and roof goes on well. Challenge 3 - 40 metre truck and trailer getting stuck on site. Plus our truck and trailer delivering 550 bales. Luckily, the trusty 40 horse power tractor pulls the truck out. Two small, very excited boys look on from the Rent A Shack.
I almost missed challenge 1 ½ – the concrete contractor ran out of sealer half way through finishing off our floor. Additional sealer took 2 weeks to arrive, due to the Christchurch quake. Outcome – line of different colours running through the finished floor of our lounge.
Oh my gosh, talking about floor, it was my turn to contribute to the challenges big time! Challenge number 3 - painting mulseal on the floor where the strawbales are stacked, being extra careful not to spill any on the floor, I managed to use the wrong end of the metre stick I had marked, painting out to 550mls instead of 450mls. Outcome – 100mls of mulseal (a tar like substance) on our finished floor. Man I still get angry at myself for this one – best not to mention it.
All in all, we are looking forward to the completion of our straw bale home – definitely before xmas this year.
Now I know what people mean by building being a nightmare! We have another builder now, are making good progress, and look forward to starting the meshing of the straw bales this week.
Onto other important matters - on the wine front were hoping to deliver to our customers NZ's first preservative free wine. I am sorry to say we were unsuccessful this year. I am not happy with the finished product. It does not seem to have the same high quality as our other wines. We have learnt a few things, and we will try again next year.
On the current stocks front, the Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and Rose are getting low. Likely to be sold out in the next month. Don't miss out, order now. Our Gewurztraminer is tasting fantastic at present and we still have our Burgundy style Viognier.
Some more good news, we are excited to announce the release of our first Reserve Gewurztraminer this year and fully certified organic Methode Traditionnelle in October this year. We will keep you posted.
Our wines can be ordered online at www.wrightswines.co.nz direct from us, delivered to you freight free.