Felton Road, 'Cornish Point' Pinot Noir, 2025
Felton Road, 'Cornish Point' Pinot Noir, 2025
- 75cl
- 13.5%
- Red Still
- Pinot Noir
- Organic
- Biodynamic
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Drinking window: 2026 - 2033
Est. delivery in Autumn, 2026
Felton Road needs little introduction in Central Otago, and 'Cornish Point' is one of the reasons why. Named after the distinctive peninsula that juts into Lake Dunstan near Bannockburn, this single-vineyard Pinot Noir comes from schist-driven soils at around 280 metres — low altitude by Otago standards, which gives it a slightly warmer, more generous character than the estate's higher-sited wines.
"Inviting and attractive aromatics provide immediate focus of what is about to come: a wave of classic florals underpinned with cherry and raspberry. A burst of rich fruit leads the palate to a mouthfeel that is opulent and seductive. The vibrant finish is complimented with a fine dust of tannin lining the fruit and spice characters. A typical Cornish Point and immensely satisfying wine to aptly celebrate the vineyard’s 25th year!"
Winemaker's note
The 2025 vintage is early days, but the vineyard reliably produces Pinot with that distinctive Central Otago combination: fruit clarity, floral lift, and a cool mineral backbone that keeps the whole thing taut.
Cornish Point sits on a low-elevation peninsula near Bannockburn in the Cromwell Basin, with ancient schist bedrock broken down into thin, free-draining soils that stress the vines just enough. At around 280 metres above sea level, it's among the warmest of Felton Road's sites, catching reflected warmth from Lake Dunstan and ripening earlier than the higher blocks. The continental climate — scorching summers, cold nights, and a dry growing season — preserves acidity while allowing full phenolic ripeness. That schist is everything here: it's what gives the wine its mineral spine and why the fruit never tips into sweetness.
Central Otago is the world's southernmost wine region and New Zealand's only continental climate wine area, set deep inland on the South Island at altitudes between 200 and 450 metres. It has GI status under New Zealand's wine law and encompasses several distinct sub-regions — Bannockburn, Gibbston, Wanaka, and others — each with subtle differences in altitude, aspect, and frost exposure. Pinot Noir is king here, and while Marlborough gets more column inches, Central Otago is where New Zealand's most serious Pinot Noir is made. The region's relative youth as a wine area, combined with its dramatic schist geology and extreme diurnal temperature swings, gives its wines a character unlike anywhere else on earth.
The 2025 vintage in Central Otago is, at time of writing, the most recent harvest, and detailed analytical consensus is still forming. What we do know is that the region has been on a remarkable run of form through the early 2020s, and early producer reports from 2025 point to a season that largely continued that momentum, with a warm, dry ripening period helping growers achieve good phenolic maturity across the board. Central Otago lives and dies by its continental extremes, and vintages that manage to thread the needle between its fierce UV intensity and the cool nights of the Cromwell Basin tend to produce wines of real definition and freshness alongside ripe fruit.
Pinot Noir, as ever, is the one to watch. If early indications hold, 2025 should offer wines with the kind of taut red fruit and structural clarity the region does better than almost anywhere in the Southern Hemisphere. Expect them to reward patience rather than demand it. Most will drink well from 2027 onwards, with the best sites and producers likely carrying comfortably until 2032 or beyond. We'd watch this space closely as more bottles start arriving.
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Felton Road
