Winemaker Notes
Blend: 76% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Malbec, 4% Petit Verdot
Professional Ratings
-
James Suckling
That this is an elegant wine is the first thing to note here. The nose has hints of gravel and leafy nuances — a textbook regional expression. It's really seductive, and there's a fusion of bright and vibrant redcurrants, boysenberries and red cherries together with cassis and blue plums as well as mulberries. Some fresh, violet-like florals and freshly cut herbs also come into play along with pomegranate and deliciously fresh and cedary oak that's well played in behind vineyard-focused characters. The richer malbec fruits are clear here, and at 20% of the blend, it has a role to play, both in terms of the upfront plushness and back palate depth. The old vines are also working some magic within the layers of structure and length here. The palate's immaculate and supple, the tannins are fluid, long and polished, and there's detail here as well as depth, before things culminate in an incredibly fresh finish. Tannins are superbly elegant and truly refined. This is a wine of finesse and fine detail. Beautifully grown, perfectly captured and astutely crafted. This is everything a great wine should be and a new step for Vasse Felix, Margaret River and for Australian cabernet. Drink 2020-2030+.
-
Decanter
A new flagship wine celebrating the founder of Vasse Felix, the region's first winery. It is complex, multi-layered and seamless, with gentle blackcurrant aromas and a hint of pepper, followed by a medium-bodied, velvety palate of surprising softness. Ripe, ultra-fine tannins. Drinking Window 2023 - 2042
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2013 Tom Cullity Cabernet Sauvignon Malbec is today 12 years from its harvest and marks the beginning of the Tom Cullity cuvée, a Cabernet Malbec made from the original vines on the Vasse Felix property, planted in 1967. While the Tom Cullity style is inherently elegant, I recall this wine being rich and fulsome upon its release, however today—and, in fact, earlier this year—the wine has begun to evolve into the elegant thing it will become in time. There are notes of nori, licorice, dark chocolate, earth and tapenade. Rating: 96+
-
Wine & Spirits
Virginia Willcock makes this wine from the Vasse Felix Home Vineyard, which Tom Cullity first planted in 1967. This vintage, from a warm summer and a long, cool harvest season, layers gentle, savory tannins and honeyed blue fruit. Focused on cabernet sauvignon (76 percent), with malbec (20 percent) and petit verdot, it’s a young, minty red that needs bottle age to develop, or short ribs to show itself more fully.
A noble variety bestowed with both power and concentration, Cabernet Sauvignon enjoys success all over the globe, its best examples showing potential to age beautifully for decades. Cabernet Sauvignon flourishes in Bordeaux's Medoc where it is often blended with Merlot and smaller amounts of some combination of Cabernet Franc, Malbecand Petit Verdot. In the Napa Valley, ‘Cab’ is responsible for some of the world’s most prestigious, age-worthy and sought-after “cult” wines. Somm Secret—DNA profiling in 1997 revealed that Cabernet Sauvignon was born from a spontaneous crossing of Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc in 17th century southwest France.
Home to some of Australia’s most elegant and long-lived red and white wines, Margaret River is situated in the farthest reaches of Western Australia. Relatively warm and dry, the region is cooled by breezes from the Indian Ocean. Margaret River takes some inspiration from Bordeaux, producing top-quality Cabernet Sauvignons and Bordeaux Blends with firm structure, mouthwatering acidity, balanced alcohol and notes of herbs and spice. For white wines, refreshing blends of Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon as well as complex, age-worthy Chardonnays are regional specialties.