2023 New Zealand Whites: The Cyclone Vintage 

BY REBECCA GIBB MW | APRIL 12, 2024

It was not the cover shoot of dreams, nor was it the image the editor thought they’d be publishing in the post-harvest issue of the local wine industry magazine. However, the New Zealand Winegrower could not ignore Cyclone Gabrielle’s impact on the wine community and its vineyards. Philip Barber of Petane Wines stood in his shorts and Wellington boots, a thick layer of silt, sludge and debris covering what had been his flourishing Hawke’s Bay vineyard and home a few days earlier.  

Cyclone Gabrielle made landfall on New Zealand’s North Island on February 12, 2023. Authorities declared the storm that followed over the next four days the worst storm since Cyclone Bola in 1988. Huge swells battered the coast, numerous landslides occurred, and river silts buried some homes and vineyards. In Hawke’s Bay, people climbed onto rooftops in fear for their lives because of widespread flooding. Forced evacuations, bridge collapses and power outages left winegrowers and friends unaccounted for over several days.

South Island producers appeared to be suffering from survivor's guilt, which was not the headline the wine community had been hoping for. While their friends feared for their lives and livelihoods, the South Island had a comparative drizzle. The Marlborough region recorded average rainfall in February, although in the more exposed Awatere sub-region, it was twice the average of the Wairau Valley.

Sauvignon Blanc dominates the Marlborough landscape, where ambitious producers are looking to emphasize texture rather than aromatics.

A white wine vintage report on New Zealand inevitably focuses on Marlborough. It dominates the country’s white wine scene, accounting for 81% of the nation’s total white crop, with Sauvignon Blanc making up 78% of the production. And, following the 2022 harvest, growers and producers were relieved in 2023 – relieved after a bad season plagued with rain and disease pressure the year before, leading to forced picking decisions and wine infected by botrytis. Indeed, 2022 was neither the most fun of vintages to make nor to taste, and many remain somewhat scarred by the experience.

According to the annual Vineyard Monitoring Report from the New Zealand Ministry of Primary Industry (MPI), rain in November and December 2022 and January 2023 created significant disease pressure while boosting growth in the canopy and weeds. The response? Shorter periods between sprays and the opening of the canopy not only increased the efficacy of those sprays but also bolstered ventilation and sunlight exposure. In its vintage survey, the MPI noted: “A third of the respondents described the season as challenging due to the regular rainfall, but most were happy with results, both in terms of yield and quality.”

Tasting the 2023s, the vintage is clearly not exuberant. Going into harvest, there was undoubtedly some post-twenty-two stress, which may have affected the response to the season. Based on the greener, less flamboyant aromatic spectrum of the wines, was it a case of safety first, tropical fruit later? Clive Jones, long-time winemaker of Nautilus, concedes, “Knowing everything was on the knife edge and after last year, we [the region’s growers] were probably a bit trigger-happy as a broad generalization. ‘Can we pick today, or should we leave it until tomorrow? Let’s pick today.’ Were people less risk-averse? Maybe we could have pushed it further in retrospect.”