Dog Point Vineyards has the largest amount of certified organic vineyard land in New Zealand, thanks to its visionary founders, Ivan Sutherland and James Healy, who grow grapes for themselves and sell to a number of other winemakers in this country. 

The Dog Point Sauvignon Blanc is one of Marlborough's best, thanks to high quality grapes, post ferment lees aging and the result is a dry, medium bodied white from one of the world's biggest Sauvignon regions. This is an iconic wine from an exceptionally dedicated winemaking team.

Winemaker Simon Waghorn brings grapes together from three sub regions of Marlborough to make this dry, full bodied style of Sauvignon Blanc. Vineyards in the Wairau Valley, Awatere Valley and Kekerengu Coast (the most southern of Marlborough's vineyards) all combine to make this succulent dry wine with its ripe flavours of tropical fruit balanced by green notes. 

All grapes are machine harvested at night or in the cool parts of the day to preserve the purity and intensity of flavours. WInemaker Simon Waghorn blends to suit what he thinks is Astrolabe’s style, which reflects what he has learnt as a winemaker and drinker over the years. This means he aims to create a Sauvignon that tastes dry, expressive and elegantly balanced with flavours of passionfruit, blackcurrant leaf and gooseberry. 

The story of Astrolabe

Diversity, history and family ownership are among the reasons to try the outstanding range of wines from Astrolabe, which was founded in 1996 in Marlborough by winemaker Simon Waghorn and his partner in life and wine, Jane. 

Simon has forged a reputation for being one of New Zealand's most respected producers of aromatic white wines after winning an almost embarrassingly long string of awards for his Sauvignon Blancs. He has also forged a name for adventurously diverse winemaking - he produces dry flinty whites from the most southern vineyard in Marlborough at Kekerengu on the coast about an hour's drive south of Blenheim. He is the only winemaker to produce wines from here. 

He is also one of the few in this country to make Albarino, Chenin Blanc and a consistently outstanding range of wines from the organically certified hillside sloping site that is the Wrekin Vineyard in Marlborough. 

The winery remains family owned and is now run by two generations, including Simon and Jane as well as their adult daughters. 

Marlborough is best known and loved for Sauvignon Blanc but here's a next level wine from one of the most experienced winemakers in the region, Kevin Judd; the first winemaker at Cloudy Bay and then founder of his own brand, Greywacke.

This wine is incredibly consistent in style from one year to the next. Dry, full bodied with powerful intensity of flavour and a long finish. It benefits from winemaking experience, which includes lees aging time and a portion of barrel ferment to add softness and complexity.

Section 94 is one of New Zealand great white wines, made from a small portion of vineyard land that was named Section 94 on the country's original lands and survey map. It's the brainchild of the highly experienced viticulturist-winemaking duo, Ivan Sutherland (one time Olympic medal winning rower) and James Healy, the grapes are 100% barrel fermented in new French oak followed by aging in oak. Complex, great and long lived maverick wine.

Layers of depth with nutty aromas and full bodied with dry flavours. Drinks well on release and can also age, as this example shows. It is 100% Sauvignon Blanc but is not labelled with the varietal as Sutherland and Healy want to highlight what's possible from the land first and foremost.

Greystone is one of North Canterbury's wine stars situated on the slopes of limestone rich hills in Omihi. All of the grapes that go into Greystone wines are 100% certified organic with BioGro NZ and all are estate grown. No additional fruit is purchased to supplement production, which is one of many incremental steps that go into Greystone's high quality wines. 

This Sauvignon Blanc was 100% barrel fermented in old oak with wild yeasts and is made from fully certified organic grapes with BioGro NZ certification. Like all Greystone wines, it is made entirely from estate grown fruit with nothing bought in to supplement production. This is one of many incremental steps at Greystone that consistently ensures high quality. Partial malolactic fermentation provides creamy flavour notes to this wine, which are kept in check with the balance of bright acidity and a light spicy taste which further adds complexity.

Certified organic with BioGro NZ.

About Greystone

The Greystone wine story began in 2000 when the Thomas Family bought an old sheep farm on the Omihi hills in the Waipara Valley, North Canterbury. The rolling limestone hills lured this family in and their goal was a single minded one: to make great wines from the limestone rich soils here. Fast forward 20 years and Greystone is one of the great (and, some might say, yet to be fully discovered) wineries in this outstanding wine region. Not least due to the work of winemaker Dom Maxwell and general manager Nick Gill, who began working together in 2005 and has grown along with the brand and quality.

This stunning South Island Sauvignon Semillon blend is a maverick New Zealand take on the classic white Bordeaux blend, offering fresh, bright and delicious aromas of ripe apple, lime, gooseberry and passionfruit. The Sauvignon (70%) brings fruit flavours and excellent acidity while the Semillon (30%) brings fruit weight, richness and age ability, due to its pronounced acidity. 

Both varieties were aged on their natural deposits of yeast lees for approximately 10 months, prior to blending. This lees contact brings creaminess and body. Once bottled, the wine was left to age for another year before release, allowing the varietal characters to integrate further.

This wine drinks deliciously well now, preferably served in a large glass, but it has a long history of great age ability too and is a good wine for the cellar.

Fantastic value for money, dry and flinty with brief lees maturation adding depth, which balances the fresh acidity in this zesty little wine. It was fined once and lightly filtered before bottling.  

Clos Henri began 22 years ago in Marlborough when the French Bourgeois family expanded their winemaking from the heart of Sancerre in the tiny village of Chavignol to Blenheim, in 2001. Now that their vines are 22 years of age , the family feels that they are only now starting to reflect and express the taste of the land. This family retains their land and winemaking in Chavignol where they have made wine for 11 generations.

Swiftsure Sauvignon Blanc is blended from carefully selected sites to capture the essence of Marlborough. Like contrasting combinations of colour, the vivid hues and muted shades of the Marlborough landscape and the tinted waters of both river and sea evoke a sensation of the purity of nature captured within the wine; mineral, fresh, ripe, and delicious.

Their Southern Coast Vineyard is situated in Marlboroughs southernmost sub-region in the shadow of the Kaikoura Ranges.

Its relatively elevated position and the influence of the cooler coastal climate and sea breeze result in lower yields and concentrated flavours.

Bursting with aromas; an abundance of tropical fruits, crisp citrus, punchy jalapeno, and fresh herbs this wine showcases the intensity that has made Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc famous the world over. The palate is refined and classical with a vibrancy of fruit and a mineral purity that creates a sense of sophistication and elegance.

Iconic Martinborough Sauvignon Blanc with vibrant fresh acidity, balanced by ripe notes of tropical and citrus zest. This wine contains 3.3 grams of residual sugar which adds textural appeal and retains a dry fresh taste. Dry wines contain less than 5 grams per litre.

Palliser Estate's Sauvignon Blanc has a long track record of being one of New Zealand's best. A wine that balances appealing ripe tropical fruit flavours with zesty notes of citrus, green herbs and ripeness that provides great structure to this wine.

All the grapes in Ata Rangi Sauvignon Blanc are hand picked and sorted into portions, many of which go through whole bunch fermentation on skins in large oak barrels which provides smooth, dry flavours and textures. The remaining portions are fermented in stainless steel to retain fruit freshness and crisp characters, which make for a vibrant and complex expression of Sauvignon Blanc from the Wairarapa. 

This is an exceptional wine which shines a new light on New Zealand's well worn Sauvignon theme. Try it!

The name Ata Rangi is Maori for dawn sky and was chosen to portray the new beginning that the start of this winery represented for founder Clive Paton in the late 1970s.

This Sauvignon Blanc is all about precision and feel. Bright notes of green apple and fennel glide over a chalk-dusted, subtly creamy core.

A firm mineral seam underpins the wine, while layers of grapefruit zest and savoury tomato leaf build in complexity. It tapers to a dry, grainy finish with an almost tactile grip.

A textural style Sauvignon that is layered and complex, with a racy mineral backbone, thanks to the alluvial gravels of the Martinborough terrace and the unique growing conditions of Martinborough.

W I N E M A K E R S   N O T E 

From the exceptional 2024 vintage this is our first release of Sauvignon Blanc under the Escarpment label. Fermentation was conducted in a range of stainless-steel tanks, along with 20% in French Oak puncheons, 2% of the blend in new oak and a small portion fermented on skins. A mix of indigenous and inoculated yeast were used. Aged for 6 months before bottling.  This is a Sauvignon that showcases sophistication and texture, along with a limey/mineral backbone that gives great length and purity, and a moreish finish that will have you reaching for another glass.

T A S T I N G 

Gooseberry, nettle and guava are accompanied by lifted white floral notes, with the fruit sitting in the tropical spectrum. The palate is hinged together by textural elements that are balanced by restrained, but intense, fruit weight. There is a lovely seam of limey acidity that brings drive and offers a long lingering finish to the wine. It showcases the minerality and purity we get in white wines grown on the alluvial gravels.