Blackenbrook Vineyard
Our News
Blackenbrook in the Press
2010
- Nelson – undeniably a Fine Wine Region
- Touring Nelson’s fantastic Wineries with Neil Hodgson
- Chris Patten of London’s Financial Times muses over his recent visit to Nelson
- Sue Courtney visits Blackenbrook in her bright yellow MG
- Neil Hodgson blown away by Vintage 2010
- Dream Harvest expected
- How I started my own winery – an inspirational tale by New Zealand Life & Leisure
- Nelson – home of New Zealand’s finest aromatic wines
- The phenomenal popularity of Pinot Gris shows no signs of waning
- Awesome Aromatics by Jo Burzynska
2009
- Riesling 2008 featured in Warren Barton’s Christmas Wine Guide
- International Trophy for Blackenbrook Sauvignon Blanc 2007
- Sue Courtney raves about our Pinot Gris 2008
- Blackenbrook well received
- Gold from Bragato
- Nelson aromatics show class
- Getting Competitive
- Innovation at Blackenbrook
- Nelson winery back as Kiwi rep.
- Hodgson on our Gewurztraminer ’08
- Blackenbrook Wines Full of Flavour
- Top New Zealand Rieslings
- NZ Winemakers – the new guard..
2008
2007
Sustainability and Innovation are words we take seriously here, and always have. They are at the core of our wine-making principles. Neil Hodgon’s wine column profiled some of the innovations in our winery and vineyards in his column in the Nelson Mail in July.
He writes:
A sustainable future
Wine column by Neil Hodgson (14th July 2009)
I have often talked about the innovation that takes place in the general world of winemaking, be it in the vineyards or the winery. One Nelson winery that has embraced innovation to ensure its winemaking operation is as environmentally sustainable as possible
without compromising quality is Blackenbrook vineyards.
Daniel and Ursula Schwarzenbach built a new winery in 2006, and lots of thought went into the design.
Drawing on experience working around the world, Daniel included many features you may not even be aware of if you visit the facility. Simple things like the location of the winery which has been cut into a bank on their land, providing natural temperature control, reducing the need for manual heating and cooling of the wine tanks.
Gently sloping floors that allow water to be collected and disposed of are nothing new, but at Blackenbrook, the wast water is collected and filtered for recycling in the vineyard.
The drains in the floor contain screens to catch most of the grape waste that occurs during winemaking. Collection the bulky waste at this point reduces the time the water needs to settle before being sprayed on paddocks around the vineyard, and also takes away the possibility of nasty odours developing in the settling tanks.
The sloping floor and tank layout, close to drains, means that tanks can be washed directly into the drain sumps, again removing the risk of various bugs accumulating, reducing the amount of cleaning required and reducing water use.
The are plenty of other building innovations at Blackenbrook as well as winemaking innovations, and having tasted some barrel samples of the 2009 pinot noir, I can assure you that the latest innovation in fermenting red wines is a huge success.
