Swinney Farvie Grenache 2022

In the late 1990s, Grenache was hardly known in Western Australia, let alone in Great Southern. But, inspired by the great wines of France and Spain—and believing that Grenache could do well in a region already building a reputation for high-quality Syrah—Matt Swinney ignored the experts (who said Grenache would never ripen in the cool climate of Frankland River) and planted the region’s first bush-vine Grenache vineyard. He did so with mass-selection cuttings provided by David Hohnen and gave his new vines pride of place on the site’s hilltops.

Take a walk through Swinney’s untrellised Grenache bush vines, and things change about halfway down the block planted in 2004 on the estate’s upper northeast-facing hillside crest. The soil gets leaner and shallower, with more gravel and a higher clay content. “That’s Farvie,” says Rob Mann. This fruit is different, too; it is more ferrous and mineral with fine, velvety tannins and so much complexity. Vines are picked over multiple passes, with only the best bunches from each vine—those sitting in the dappled light of the vine’s architecture—set aside for Farvie.

Once in the winery, the bunches are berry sorted, then gravity-fed to French oak for natural fermentation, incorporating 28% whole bunches. With Mourvèdre now a mainstay in the Farvie range in its own right, its inclusion in this wine has steadily decreased each year. This year, just 4% of Mourvèdre co-fermented with the Grenache (compared to 7% in 2020 and 14% in 2019). The wine spent 11 days on skins before being pressed to large, fine-grained, seasoned French oak vessels, where it matured for 11 months.