Ata Rangi

"...the long-serving, dedicated team behind Ata Rangi just go  from strength to strength. Their Pinots have always been great and yet, even in a world where the Pinot benchmark  gets higher every year, Ata Rangi is better than ever." Lisa Perrotti-Brown MW, eRobertParker.com, April 2013

...an excellent tasting experience in a leafy setting with friendly and extremely knowledgeable cellar-door staff....

Ata Rangi, meaning "dawn sky" or "new beginning" is a small New Zealand winery with an enviable international reputation for PInot Noir. Located at the southern end of the North Island, it is owned and managed by a family trio - Clive Paton, wife Phyll and Clive's sister Ali. Clive planted the first vines on a small, stony sheep paddock at the edge of the Martinborough village in 1980 as one of a handful of people who pioneered winegrowing in ...

Soil health is our big focus. We're now certaified to fully organic status, after several years of transition. Weeds are now kept under control by a Berti Ecology under-vineweeder which means herbicides are a thing of the past. Insecticides have never been used in the 30+ years of vineyard management at Ata Rangi, instead favouring biological options such as predatory wasps for leaf roller caterpillar control. Large scale compost is made on si...

With just nine wines in our range, along with occasional releases of limited-volume offerings for our mail order customers, it's possible to stay 'hands-on' and to give both vines and wines the attention they deserve. In all our wines we aim for fine balance, with structures and textures that deliver far more satisfying, almost more savoury, mouth-filling experiences than wines that rely mainly on youth and 'pretty' aromatics.

 

We produ...

Vintage 2014 / It's certainly true in this business that no matter how long you're in it, you'll never have two growing seasons the same. Martinborough 2014 was a case in point, with bud-burst occurring a full three weeks earlier than 'usual'. With the warm and damp December, canopy growth was strong.

It looked as though we might have the whole crop into the winery almost a month earlier than usual, which at the time made us a little nervou...