Kanonkop Pinotage 2013 Black Label

In 1925, a certain Professor Abraham Perold of the University of Stellenbosch decided to cross Pinot Noir with Cinsault (also called Hermitage locally): this was the birth of the famous Pinotage, a unique grape variety associated with South Africa. Almost 100 years later, Pinotage rhymes with Kanonkop. Here the 2013, after 10 years in the bottle, enters its phase of fullness.

The Black Label was introduced as a limited-edition bottling with the 2006 vintage, cementing the team's confidence in South Africa's own red variety. Black Label is made from one of the oldest Pinotage vineyards in South Africa, one planted in 1953 on a site that has over the years proved to produce fruit of specific excellence and deemed special enough to be bottled under an own label.

There are only 3,500 bottles of this incredible wine, produced from a three-hectare block of 62-year-old Pinotage, so it will be in demand, even at what is a high price for South Africa. Dense, complex and concentrated, it's a wine that supersedes its grape variety's limitations: plush, aromatic and sweet, with black and red fruits in delicous harmony, carrying its 100% new oak with style. Tim Atkin MW, SA Special Report 2015, 97/100

2013 celebrates vineyard's 60th anniversary in fine fashion. Serene in its concentration, with fine line of energy lifting ripe, dark fruits, viscosity.