In a wine world where The Story seems to have become more important than The Wine, it’s refreshing to sit down and taste with a winemaker who gets straight down to brass tacks. “It was a great year, but we had to struggle for it,” said Huw Kinch, a winemaker all too familiar with the perils of growing grapes in a marginal climate. Pyramid’s Waikari yields were wincingly small, dropping to a low of 11 hl/ha. The chief culprit: a severe spring snowstorm in October that froze and damaged more than 50% of the Pinot and Chardonnay shoots.But, like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis, the resulting wines are something to behold. Kinch explained that, thanks to the reduced crop load, his remaining fruit ripened perfectly; the bottled wines offer not only greater fruit intensity than the 2022 vintage, but greater perfume, tension and radiant structure (all at very moderate alcohols, we might add). We won’t be alone in suggesting that at least a few of these blocks have never made a more riveting young wine than in 2023; wines that feel alive in the glass and exude an authenticity that is hardwired into the DNA of the world’s greatest growers. You could argue the same goes for the new member of the Botanical family, Snake's Tongue, which one scribe notes “has set a benchmark for 2023 [Otago] Pinots.”Pyramid Valley has always been about individuality rather than one-upmanship. This is precisely as it should be with terroir-driven wines—individuality is the key. In Huw Kinch’s words, “I don’t think you can make wines like these from any other site in the world. They are so unique. Whether you like them or not comes down to personal taste. That’s what makes great wine so captivating—it cannot be replicated.”So here we have a great vintage from a sublime producer—there’s the story. For more on the vintage and winemaking (and some great maps and pictures), please see Pyramid’s Botanicals Collection detailed release notes.In addition to the Botanicals Collection, we’re also delighted to introduce one of the newest labels in the Pyramid Valley stable—Mānatu Chardonnay, sourced from the Swann Road blocks of Pyramid Valley’s Mānatu vineyard in the Lowburn subregion of Central Otago.