Kusuda Riesling 2024

Kusuda Riesling 2024

From Boulders Vineyard on Martinborough Terrace, leased since the 2017 vintage. Harvested by hand with extreme selection. Whole bunch pressed and settled over 48 hours. Fermented in stainless steel for two weeks to a bone dry 1.2g of residual sugar. 8046 bottles produced.

Hiro: "2024 will be remembered as an extremely dry year in stark contrast to the wet 2023. Some surrounding trees even withered thanks to the drought conditions, which delivered less than 20mm of rain in January and February. Good rain later in December and exceptionally low minimum temperatures on many days in summer saved the vintage, resulting in freshness which would otherwise not have survived the drought."

"The aromatic quality is fantastic here, with lemon blossoms, clementine skin and melons, ever so refined. Medium-bodied, it shows lots of energy and sophistication. There’s a lovely acidity and crispness to the precise fruit, a light flintiness adding to the complexity. Tangy at the end. Pure. Drink now." 96 points, James Suckling

This is so small an operation, entirely worked by the Kusudas, with a little help from Japanese friends who fly in to help with the vintage, that it could almost be called bonsai. The total production of Kusuda Wines in Martinborough is but a few hundred cases of Syrah and Pinot Noir a year. Jancis Robinson MW

In the North Island I came across the utterly different yet equally remarkable Pinot Noirs of Kusuda Wines. Here again, I tasted sheer remarkableness. Owner-winemaker Hiroyuki Kusuda, born and raised in Japan and now residing in New Zealand, is obsessed with extreme berry selection. Kusuda brings in 50 Japanese pickers at harvest, and he described (and displayed photographs of) the most rigorous and extreme berry-sorting that I've ever heard of. The result? Suffice it to say that you can taste the difference. The future! Matt Kramer, The Wine Spectator

Thesis completed, graduation followed in 2001. Having exhausted his savings during his four years at Geisenheim, Kusuda leased an unirrigated pinot vine yard near Martinborough, and made the first vintage (and all subsequent vintages) at the Schubert Winery in 2002. While pinot noir remains the principal focus, he makes a similar amount of syrah (3000 to 4000 bottles of each if the vintage is kind), and made his first riesling in 2009. It is here his Japanese army comes into play: every year 20 to 30 friends fly in from Japan at their own expense. One tonne of pinot grapes will typically take two days to hand-pick and thereafter undergo a berry-by-berry inspection (after passing through the destemmer). Even the slightest imperfection will result in rejection; the true cost of production is many times the price of the wine. James Halliday