2018 The Factor
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Tasting notes
100% Shiraz from four pre-phylloxera 19th century vineyards. The Factor offers a darker, brooding expression with lashings of dark cocoa and black fruit of such primary abundance that it is sure to carry the wine into a long, fruit-driven development. Alongside are notes of leather, spice and coffee. Lovely acidity and salinity provides freshness, layering seamlessly with this savoury and full-bodied wine’s plush concentration and carrying into a beautifully long and full finish.
Critic scores
Average Score
Huon Hooke, The Real Review
Jancis Robinson MW
More reviews and scores
100% Shiraz from Gomersal and Marananga with some from Krondorf and Ebenezer with an average age of 20 years picked 15 March to 4 April. Aged for 24 months in French barriques (40% new). Blackish crimson. The nose manages to have tarry notes but to suggest enormous smoothness. Gosh, on the palate it's almost like satin! And the tannin and alcohol lightly insinuates on the finish. Hints of cassis and mulberry. And this is approachable already!!! The acidity is well judged. This is pretty smart, if you're looking for a powerful, quintessentially South Australian red – though the price indicates it's fit only for special occasions. Luxurious. (JR)
Aged in about 50% new French oak and built for cellaring, the 2018 The Factor is a concentrated, structured Shiraz that should age well for up to two decades. Scents of cedar shavings and vanilla mark the nose, while the full-bodied palate folds in notes of ripe blackberries and mulberries, plus hints of baking spices. Complex, firm and age-worthy, with a long, focused finish, it should be at its best after about five more years.
Very deep, dark red/purple colour, with a bouquet that shouts north-western Barossa: graphite, ironstone, fresh turned earth, savoury and complex. The wine is very full-bodied, and strongly built: the carpentry is impressive (that's structure, not oak). Superbly rich, fleshy and sustained through a very long palate and follow-through. It shapes up like a whopper but the tannins are supple and fine, smooth and not at all forbidding as we might have anticipated. Excellent. (30% new French oak. Northern & Western Barossa grapes)