Margaret River Cabernet Sauvignon 2021, Chardonnay 2022

Untypically for one of our vintage reports, in Western Australia we’ve put the spotlight on different vintages for red and white, with Cabernets coming from the tricky 2021 and Chardonnays from the contrastingly heat-driven 2022. Our author in residence selects 20 top wines from each

- CASSANDRA CHARLICK

For Decanter’s inaugural Margaret River vintage report, producers were asked to submit wines from the 2021 vintage for Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnays from 2022, which were all then tasted blind. While the 2022 whites shone, the 2021 reds reflected the cooler and somewhat challenging vintage conditions many faced, including unusual February rainfall. Should a wine score be indicative of what’s typically expected of the region and variety, or is it fairer and more useful to look at the wine with fresh eyes and no preconceived ideas? There are champions for both approaches; mine here is not to reprimand wines that don’t speak of typicity, if the hallmarks of a great wine are nonetheless there to be found.

CABERNET SAUVIGNON 2021

Ask any Cabernet Sauvignon winemaker from Margaret River how 2021 was and it’s unlikely you’ll receive the same answer twice. Conditions in the Western Australian region were challenging, so sub-regional variation is evident in the resulting wines. While not being official GIs (geographical indications), six sub-regions – (north to south) Yallingup, Carbunup, Wilyabrup, Treeton, Wallcliffe and Karridale – were proposed in a 1999 paper by the late Dr John Gladstones, a major pioneering influence in the region from the mid-1960s. In light of the soil and climate differences upon which these six areas were delineated, marginal years such as 2021 highlight that it is impossible to paint the Margaret River appellation with broad strokes.

The Margaret River Wine Association lists 181 wineries producing a Margaret River GI wine, yet just 38 Cabernet Sauvignons were submitted to the tasting for this report. ‘A lot came down to the late stages in April 2021, with the moisture from the early morning dews. If you didn’t have vines set up with good exposure there was disease risk and difficulty ripening,’ shares Eloise Jarvis, a consultant winemaker in the region.