Stephen Shelmerdine never applies any pressure on his Pinot vines to perform. Handling fruit and wine by gravity, knowing when not to interfere, indigenous yeasts and a subdued use of oak, all help to render the style. The challenge is to preserve aromas and to let the palate form by itself. A pure, small batch Pinot wine, elegance and finesse are the defining characters, matched by fine texture and good structure. The result is subtlety over sunshine, terroir over intervention and delicacy over extraction, fashioned to be beautiful to drink.

Lusatia Park Block B is one of the more aromatic Pinot Noir sites in upper Yarra Valley. Pinot clone MV6 vines are cane pruned to twenty five buds and shoot thinned at the 10cm or 15cm stage to yield eighteen 80gm bunches each. All grapes are hand harvested, hand sorted and destemmed into six tonnes open fermenters, a portion of whole bunches are included. Natural vinification ensues as the cap recieves an occasional plunge toward the end of ferments. After two or three weeks on skins, batches are pressed, settled overnight and gravity filled to French oak casks for up to a year's maturation. Barrels are racked once again and filled to bottle without fining or filtration.