Graillot Australia is a collaboration between Northern Rhône icon Alain Graillot and our own Robert Walters. The venture begins and ends with a special 3.3 hectare plot in Heathcote. The site is an east-facing, close-planted (5500 vines per hectare), hillside vineyard in the Mt Camel Ranges “sub-region”. It’s a slow-ripening site with very rocky soils and a neutral pH. Here full physiological ripeness occurs at 12-13 degrees potential alcohol. This block has been nicknamed ‘Clos Graillot’. The ‘Clos’ has a specific location, clone, and now set of vineyard practices, which differentiates it from the rest of the site.
It is clearly a terrific vineyard, and the cooler sites along this strip, in the Mt Camel Ranges, is capable of producing some of Australia’s finest and most elegant Syrah based wines.