The Brittan Vineyard lies just 12 miles southwest of McMinnville, tucked into the foothills of the Coastal Range. The original 18 acres were planted in 2001, but due to the challenging nature of this site and limited topsoil, only eight acres survived. Since 2004 when Robert and Ellen Brittan purchased the vineyard, it has been an ongoing rehabilitation project: replating, retraining and learning the unique landscape that has become the Brittan Vineyard. The three acre, southeast facing Cygnus Block was planted in 2008 to Swan selection, a selection of Pinot noir they believe was brought in from Burgundy around the 1880s and planted in California.
2016 Brittan Estate "Cygnus Block" Pinot Noir, McMinnville, Oregon, USA
$64.99
ABOUT THIS WINE
ABOUT THIS PRODUCER
It took years to find the ideal site on which to grow Pinot Noir but after an exhaustive search, Brittan Vineyards began on an 128-acre hillside in Oregon in December 2004. The soils are a mixture of glacial deposits and volcanic material, with a predominant presence of broken basalt.
At that time, there were 18 acres of existing vines. However, close to 50% has subsequently been re-planted in order to fine-tune the viticultural practices and improve the clonal and rootstock combinations. This included one of the first plantings of the Swan clonal selection of Pinot Noir in Oregon.
After dropping all of the crop in 2005 to allow the vines to get better established, the first two Pinot Noirs from the mature vines on the property came from the 2006 vintage, a total of 720 cases.
In the spring of 2008, an additional 3.5 acres of Pinot Noir were planted, which are now in production— the rocky soils and low water retention often means that it takes five years for a vine to get into production.
In addition to the Pinot, 4 acres of Chardonnay and 1.5 acres of Syrah have been planted. These are two varietals that benefit greatly from a cool growing climate.
Details:
| Grape(s) | Pinot Noir |
| Farming | Organic |