Winemaker Notes
Located in the Dundee Hills AVA, Latchkey vineyard is on volcanic based parent material at 500 ft elevation on an East-Southeast inclination. This wine is fruit focused. Layered aromas of blueberry, apricot and strawberry compote meld with cinnamon stick and hints of nutmeg on the nose. Darker fruits emerge on this palate, met by a beautifully bright and vibrant finish.
Professional Ratings
-
Wine Enthusiast
Another fine vintage for this vineyard selection, with pretty cherry-fruit scents and flavors throughout. The citrus components lean on pink grapefruit and blood orange, and there are light hints of herb and stem adding texture and depth
-
Wine Spectator
Sleek and elegantly layered, with vibrant cherry, fresh violet and stony mineral accents that dance along a svelte finish. Drink now through 2026.
-
Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
COMMENTARY: New World or Old World? Pinot Noir excels in either space or both at the same time. The 2017 Ken Wright Latchkey Vineyard Pinot Noir takes it all in and gives us a wine that is the best of both worlds. TASTING NOTES: This well-built wine cannot be typecast in a category. Its aromas and flavors show New World fruit of ripe berries and Old World charms of dried earth. It should pair well with grilled white meat dishes. (Tasted: February 12, 2019, San Francisco, CA)
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Home of the first Pinot noir vineyard of the Willamette Valley, planted by David Lett of Eyrie Vineyard in 1966, today the Dundee Hills AVA remains the most densely planted AVA in the valley (and state). To its north sits the Chehalem Valley and to its south, runs the Willamette River. Within the region’s 12,500 acres, about 1,700 are planted to vine on predominantly basalt-based, volcanic, Jory soil.