Novum Riverbrook Vineyard Marlborough Chardonnay 2024
95 POINTS: James Suckling
94+ POINTS: Robert Parker's - The Wine Advocate
95 POINTS: Cameron Douglas MS
95 POINTS: Wine Direct Tasting Team
94 POINTS: Stephen Wong MW - The Real Review
The Riverbrook Chardonnay is defined by its sense of place. From one of Marlborough's oldest Chardonnay vineyards, grown on ancient greywacke riverbed, it carries a mineral precision that is unmistakably its own – oyster shell, wet stone and a quiet saline thread running beneath white peach and citrus. It is Burgundian in its bones: the oak is present but never the point. What stays with you is the tension, the fine acidity, and a finish that lingers like light on stone.
"The 2024 Chardonnay is excellent. It's toasty and spicy, lean and nutty, with green apple acidity and attractive waxy phenolics that shape the mid-palate and finish. This is a beautiful wine, made as a result of thoughtful farming and endeavour. It has personality and charm, alongside length of flavor and complexity to boot. It's leaner and less obviously "worked" than many Chardonnays I see coming out of Marlborough. This is super and comes recommended. 14% alcohol, sealed Diam and wax."
- Robert Parker's - The Wine Advocate
"An intriguing almost sensual bouquet of Chardonnay. Aromas of red apple and sweet peach tea, lees spices and white flowers, flint and chalk-like minerality, and a light dusting of fragrant baking spices. Very sophisticated and quite pure on the palate - dry, complex, even and lengthy. A precise palate weight with a youthful acid line, extremely fine wood tannins and fine lees texture. Flavours of white and yellow orchard fruits, wood spices and fine stone-like minerality. A delicious example, modern, youthful, complex and intriguing. Lots to like. Drink now and through 2026."
- Cameron Douglas MS
“This wine is very similar to our 2017 release in its Burgundian-esque style. I really like the prominent oyster shell / saline flavour profile and the obvious linearity of the wine, which can both be attributed to the stoney vineyard soil.”
- William Hoare Winemaker
ABV: 13.5%