2021 Hay Shed Hill Wines Chardonnay Pitchfork Margaret River 750 ml

The 2021 Hay Shed Hill Pitchfork—a scintillating, lemon-zest-fresh Margaret River Chardonnay—is a New World bargain that stuns for its brilliance, purity, and unbeatable value.

The cool, maritime corner of western Australia that produced this wine is widely recognized as a rival to the Cote d’Or when it comes to ravishing Chardonnay. Margaret River’s wines, as Wine Spectator recognized, belong “in the top rank in the world.” 

This phenomenal Pitchfork bottling, authored by master Aussie winemaker Michael Kerrigan, hails from Wilyabrup Valley, a sub-region defined by gravel soils and an ocean-ringed climate. Those conditions inform legendary founding estates like Moss Wood, Cullen, and Vasse Felix—and shape this bottle from top to bottom.

Michael set out to capture that incredible terroir without any gimmickry or shortcuts. There’s no overirrigation in the vineyards to boost yields; in fact, there’s no irrigation at all. Thanks to high rainfall levels in the area, the Chardonnay is dry-farmed. Its resulting clarity sings through on the aromas of fresh peach kissed with guava and accented with acacia flowers and savory herbs.

Nor does he play around with oak staves to achieve a cheap, woody veneer that would only serve to block this Chardonnay’s vivid, sunny sensibility. Fermented in stainless-steel tanks, the wine was bottled early to preserve the youthfulness of the primary fruit notes and tensile zing.

Michael told us he believes 2021 in Margaret River will be a classic vintage, hearkening to the lighter, more lithe Chardonnays of the early 90s. That classic character is 100% present in this bottle.