Wines> Library Wines> 1998 Arcus Estate Pinot Noir
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ORIGIN: Arcus, meaning “bow” in Latin, describes our estate vineyard that wraps around both sides of a small valley in the Red Hills of Dundee. Capturing such distinctive terroir, this wine from a single vineyard rewards Pinot Noir enthusiasts with an expansive nose, elegant finish, and outstanding expression of true Pinot Noir crafted in Burgundian tradition with “New World” techniques.
VINEYARD: The vines at Arcus Estate are planted on a very steep slope which makes farming difficult, but produces intensely flavored rich fruit which yielded only .77 tons per acre in 1998. This wine was made from 1986 plantings from the old Archibald vineyard of self rooted Pommard clones and recently planted Dijon clones 113,115 and 777 on specially selected rootstock. True to the 1998 vintage, the grapes in Arcus Estate were harvested from extremely small yields in September 1998. The fruit had intense color, tremendous concentration of flavor and great ripeness.
WINEMAKING: A unique finesse is achieved by the delicate and gentle handling of grapes throughout the winemaking process in our 100% gravity flow facility. This wine was vinified traditionally by hand picking and sorting the fruit, cold soaking the grapes with 25% whole clusters, using indigenous yeast and gently punching down one to three times a day. The wine was racked to new medium-toasted Remond French oak barrels for malolactic fermentation and was aged for 12 months in barrel. Neither fined nor filtered, the 1998 Arcus Estate was bottled in late September 1999.
TASTING NOTES: The 1998 Arcus Estate opens up intense aromas of violets, ripe raspberries, dark cherries, cinnamon and minerals. In the mouth the wine is thick and multifaceted. The tannins are supple, ripe and well integrated, while the texture is full and rich from the great concentration of sweet fruit.
This vintage produced only 478 cases, available in our unique four-bottle laydown box. It is also offered in 3-liter bottles in limited quantities.