2025 Giant Steps Primavera Vineyard Pinot Noir

Primavera is reliably the most perfumed and floral of the Giant Steps single vineyard Pinots, though this 2025 release has an extra something to it. Lou Primavera planted this small Woori Yallock vineyard in 2001, and Giant Steps has been sourcing fruit from it since 2006. At 240 metres on red clay loam with north and northeast-facing slopes, the site has a natural inclination toward fragrance and red fruit that rarely needs much encouragement.

The 2025 vintage gave it something extra. A wet winter, warm dry spring and compressed harvest produced fruit of exceptional concentration, and the wine reflects that. Each clone was fermented separately, the 115 going in as 100% whole bunch while the MV6 and G clone were fully destemmed, with a four-day cold soak before wild fermentation. Eighteen days on skins with gentle gravity mixing, then nine months in French oak barriques (18% new) on lees before blending. Bottled by gravity, no fining, no filtration.

The result is a touch more concentrated and brooding than Primavera typically shows, with damson plum, dark raspberry, crushed violet and star anise on the nose, and a richness and texture through the palate that wasn't always part of this wine's character. The freshness and perfume are still there, the tannins are persistent and finely meshed, and the whole thing is immaculate from start to finish. Our favourite Primavera to date!

95 points
"Every sip oozes confidence, class, climate and site. This is all perfume, brightness and give, within a structure, elongated context."
- Campbell Mattinson (The Wine Front)

97+ points
"A more concentrated and brooding Primavera. Aromas of damson plum, dark raspberry, lightly crushed violets and star anise. It's concentrated on the palate, too, with persistent and textured tannins that'll ensure this ages slowly and gracefully over a decade or more."
- Philip Rich (Halliday Wine Companion)