Last year St. Hugo released the first annual release in their decade long “Legacy Collection”, a collection of super premium wines that will vary from year to year in varieties, blends etc.
The Legacy Collection pays homage to the rich and compelling stories of the Gramp family, particularly Hugo Gramp who was killed in the Kyeema air crash in 1938. Not only did the crash take the life of Gramp when the DC-2 he was travelling in crashed into the side of Mt Dandenong whilst heading to Essendon, but it also took the lives of Thomas Hardy (Hardy’s Wines) and Sidney Hill Smith (Yalumba). It was one of the great tragedies to hit the Australian wine industry.
Colin Gramp was only a teenager at boarding school when he heard the news of his father’s passing. Colin had gone to the common area in the evening where the news was playing, and heard the news of his father’s passing. The next day, the last letter that Hugo ever sent Colin, arrived. Ultimately that final letter became the inspiration for last year’s release: the 2013 The Last Letter, a chest thumping, fist pounding tannin driven Barossa cabernet that deserved to be enjoyed sitting quietly beside a fire pondering the big question in life.
The 2018 release is their St HugoThe Unspoken Promise Cabernet Sauvignon 2014, honours Hugo Gramp’s best friend Rudi Buring, who took the young Colin under his wing following the death of his father. Colin, now 97, says “I can remember the day of (my fathers) funeral, Rudi introduced himself to me and said “Colin, I’m here to look after you”, and he certainly did”. Colin went on to see Rudi as mentor, guardian and dear friend. Chief Winemaker Dan Swincer says “the 2014 vintage in the Barossa resulted in low yields but produced grapes of freshness and concentration, and it’s the attributes in the fruit that have helped to craft a wine with the ability to be cellared up until 2030” This year’s vintage is made from cabernet grown in the Greenock sub-region of the Barossa Valley, spending 20 months in 60% new French oak, 20% new American oak and 20% Hungarian oak.
The 2014 Unspoken Promise is quite obviously driven by all that new oak, but it integrates well with what is a noisy wine, there is so much happening in the glass that it’s hard to concentrate on the wine itself, but it will settle with a bit of time in the bottle. It’s a cacophony of acid, toast, deep dark berry fruit some resiny notes and supple tannins. It’s a big, bold red with layers of texture and flavour, a superb long finish. With careful cellaring it will hold for the next 15years, and will really hit its stride with an extra four or five years on it.
Released just in time for the early-bird Xmas shopper, with an RRP of $75 it’s not something that you will be buying a lot of, but I’m definitely putting an order into Santa for a bottle.
