Two Paddocks Estate Pinot Noir 2022

Two Paddocks was established In 1993 when well-known actor Sam Neill planted two hectares of Pinot Noir at Gibbston in Central Otago. Since then Neill has acquired three more vineyards and Two Paddocks is in the unique position of being the only Central Otago winery with a footprint in all three of Central Otago's great valleys - Gibbston, the Alexandra Basin and the Cromwell Basin. 

The 2022 Two Paddocks Estate Pinot Noir was produced from the four Neill family Central Otago vineyards. It is a blend of fruit from Bannockburn (47%), Alexandra (31%) and Gibbston (22%), includes 46% whole bunch and was matured for 11 months in French oak barriques (18% new). 

"A beguiling nose draws you in, earthy/humus notes, raspberry, spices, berry coulis, wisp of herb, intrigue. Wonderful definition, raspberry, cherry, berryfruit, savoury touches, depth to the fruit expression yet pinosity too. Delightful grainy character flows to super lip-smacking sapidity, flavours hanging in the mouth. Vibrant, refreshing and speaks of potential."  Mark Henderson

"Red cherry, plum, blackberry bramble and spice aromatics give way to a rich, warmly textured wine exuding lush fruit, softness, elegance and poise. The wine was produced from the four Neill family Central Otago vineyards. These small sites are high-density planted in a range of clonal material cropped to under 5 Tonne per hectare with most vineyard practices carried out by hand. The wine is hand crafted using traditional methods including indigenous fermentation and hand plunging. Maturation is in French barriques for 11 months, using a mix of older and new (18%) barrels."  Two Paddocks

Expert reviews

"A beguiling nose draws you in, earthy/humus notes, raspberry, spices, berry coulis, wisp of herb, intrigue. Wonderful definition, raspberry, cherry, berryfruit, savoury touches, depth to the fruit expression yet pinosity too. Delightful grainy character flows to super lip-smacking sapidity, flavours hanging in the mouth. Vibrant, refreshing and speaks of potential."  Mark Henderson, Otago Daily Times - Outstanding

"Rich, concentrated pinot noir with cassis, dark chocolate, ripe berry/blackberry and a smattering of spicy oak. Impressive intensity with fruit smothering ripe tannins and giving a boost to drinkability despite the wine's obvious ageing potential. Very impressive. Drink 2023-2035."  Bob Campbell, The Real Review - 96 points and Wine of the Week

"Stylish and seductive, the wine shows dark plum, assorted nut, thyme, cured meat and rich floral aromas on the nose, followed by a wonderfully weighted palate displaying silky flow and fleshy texture. Tannins are fine and beautifully infused, making the wine gorgeously harmonious and persistent. A blend of grapes from Bannockburn, Earnscleugh & Gibbston Vineyards. Certified organic. At its best: 2025 to 2037."  Sam Kim, Wine Orbit – 96 points

"Certified organic, the impressive 2022 vintage was estate-grown at Bannockburn (47 per cent), Alexandra (31 per cent) and Gibbston (22 per cent), and matured for 11 months in French oak barriques (18 per cent new). Full, bright ruby, it is mouthfilling, savoury and supple, with strong, youthful cherry, plum and spice flavours, oak complexity, and excellent depth, vibrancy and harmony. A very ageworthy red, it's well worth cellaring to mid-2025+."  Michael Cooper Buyer’s Guide to New Zealand Wines  ★★★★★

"Beautifully balanced flagship release, made from a selection of fruit from all four estate vineyards. Ripe and richly perfumed, with red cherries and a whiff of violet, followed by fresh blackcurrants, lush mulberry and raspberry, a sprinkle of dried thyme and a little roasted almond. Lifted finish, subtle oak."  Susy Atkins, Decanter - 95 points

Awards

Wine of the Week - The Real Review

Central Otago

Rippon Vineyard in the Wanaka sub-region of Central Otago

Central Otago on New Zealand’s South Island is famous for wine, especially Pinot Noir. It is New Zealand’s most glamorous wine region.  Wine has been produced in this rugged, mountainous region since the heady days of the 1860s Gold Rush. 

Central Otago is the third largest wine region in New Zealand with 2,024 hectares (ha) planted to vines, a long way behind Hawke’s Bay (4,643 ha) and Marlborough (28,360 ha). In Cental Otago, 80% of the vineyard area is devoted to pinot noir, which continues to enjoy steady growth. Pinot gris is second with a little over 8% of the total vineyard area, followed by chardonnay with a 4% share. Riesling, sauvignon blanc and gewürztraminer follow in that order.

Due to the region's diverse climate, soil and aspect, the growing areas are divided into seven distinct sub-regions, all offering a different expression of Central Otago Pinot Noir. The sub-regions are Alexandra, Bannockburn, Bendigo, Cromwell/Lowburn/Pisa, Gibbston Valley, Wanaka and Queensberry (refer to the maps below).

Alexandra

It all started in Alexandra in 1864 with the planting by Frenchman Jean Desire Feraud of his Monte Christo vineyard. Although the most southerly of all the Central Otago sub-regions, it is often the hottest. Alexandra regularly records the hottest temperatures in New Zealand.

The landscape is exotic and moon-like with rocky schist outcrops everywhere providing well draining mineral soil. However, it is the extreme variation in temperature between night and day that produces beautifully aromatic, finely structured wines. During the day the intense heat produces high sugar content in the grapes and the large drop in temperature overnight preserves the high natural acid content, creating exceptionally balanced fruit.

Gibbston Valley

Bannockburn is the most familiar sub-region in Central Otago, partly because of the success of Felton Road. This north-facing bowl lies at the foot of the Cromwell Basin just to the south of Cromwell township, on the southern bank of the Kawarau River as it widens and joins Lake Dunstan and the Clutha River.

This area is very hot and dry in the summer and the soil is particularly dusty and well drained. The landscape is strewn with old sluicing mounds from gold mining days long gone. The gold miners used to call this region "the heart of the desert". Harvest can be up to a month ahead of other sub-regions, and the wines produced are highly distinctive and complex.

Bendigo

North of Cromwell along the eastern shores of Lake Dunstan and the Cluthra River is the sub-region of Bendigo. It extends along the banks of the Clutha River before it feeds into the northeast end of Lake Dunstan, then along the southeastern bank of the lake, facing Pisa on the opposite side of the valley. Bendigo Pinot Noir is richly flavored with strong tannins and is amongst the most muscular, full-bodied wines made in Central Otago. 

Cromwell/Lowburn/Pisa (Cromwell Basin)

This sub-region is located on the western side of Lake Dunstan stretching north for some 25km from the township of Cromwell. The majority of plantings are situated on the lower terraces and valley floor running parallel to the snow-capped Pisa mountain range. These vineyards produce a distinctively silky seductive style of wine. 

Gibbston Valley

Situated east of Queenstown along the spectacular Kawarau Gorge, Gibbston is the highest sub-region in Central Otago with vineyards as high as 420 meters above sea level. Its cooler climate and north-facing hillside vines ripen later than neighbouring sub-regions, producing a lighter style wine. Site selection is critical as it is the coolest of all the sub-regions, but the right vineyard in the right hands grows exquisite fruit of great colour and intensity with wonderful finesse.

Wanaka

A couple of mountain ranges and 80km north of Queenstown, beautiful Wanaka is cooler and slightly wetter than the rest of the region. The massive Lake Wanaka provides a warming effect, often protecting the grapes from late frost. Wanaka has the smallest vine plantings of all the sub-regions. It has one spectacular vineyard with magnificent views over the lake, Rippon Vineyard. The sub-region produces delicate and vivid wines.

 

Sam Neill

Sam Neill is the owner and driving  force behind Two Paddocks. He needs no introduction. The following article, an interview James Atkinson had with Sam in August 2020 for Drinks Adventures, sums up beautifully Sam's attitude to life, acting and wine.

Sam, you’ve been very active doing media for Two Paddocks in recent weeks. Is that simply because for obvious reasons, you’re more readily available to the business at the moment?

"Well we have gone through a very strange time and normally I’d be at the farm at this time and there’s always 1,001 things to do there. And if it’s not something to do with being out at the vineyard, I’d be at the office or with the animals. I mean, just there’s 1,001 things. Gardening you know, my hands are full there. But I’ve been actually marooned so to speak in Sydney, which I have to say is no great burden. I love Sydney. But it has meant that yeah, I’ve had more time on my hands and I’ve been able to do a bit of social media and so on, so I kept myself busy one way or another."

I’ve seen some of your wines achieving some quite big scores in recent times. Do you feel like Two Paddocks wine is currently making the best wine that it ever has?

"I think that’s absolutely right. The 18’s are out now and that was a really good vintage for us. There’s a couple of things about that. Obviously every vintage speaks for itself, but now all my vines are close to 20 years old. In fact, on three vineyards they’re older than that. So 20 years is the commonly accepted line in the sand for mature vines. You know, these vines, they now know where they live and they’re acclimatised. You know, they talk about grape vines rather like they do about people. They’re very delightful but mercurial up to the age of about 10. And then they go through their teens and they become sort of sulky and moody, and often brilliant, but not always. And then after about 20 years, they’ve settled down into some kind of maturity. Rather like humans. So I think that vine age is making for more consistency, we are more insulated against the vagaries of the seasons as a result. And I’ve been very happy with the last four or five vintages, they’ve been terrific."

And presumably you and the Two Paddocks wine team have gotten to understand your vineyards better, also?

"Yes and you know, you spend your life growing your understanding of your own vineyards. In any given vineyard there are always spots that stand out, that are going to be brilliant. There are going to be parts that are problematic and you work out how to work around that and that’s for a number of reasons. You know, we have different clones of pinot noir in different parts of the vineyards, and some we’ve actually removed. That clone won’t be happy in that particular space. Any vineyards, particularly in Central Otago, the soil changes every 10m or 20m. You’ll be in bright yellow clay here and you walk, you go for a 20 second walk and suddenly you’re in shisty soil or wind blow loess. Things change all the time. Yeah, so we’re learning more about our place and the vineyards are learning more about us. It’s a sort of two-way process."

Central Otago has been known for making a bigger, riper, richer style of pinot noir. Where does Two Paddocks wine fit within that?

"Well, I’ve never been in favour of that big, bold style. That’s not me at all. I always encouraged understatement and restraint, in all things actually. Including my wine. I think we’re typical of Central Otago to the extent we tend to make bright, fresh, savoury wines and they’re in the red fruit spectrum, as opposed to the dark red plummy spectrum. You see, I came to pinot via Burgundy. And Burgundy is all about elegance and restraint. We tend to perhaps pick a little bit earlier than others, I think we’ve always done that. We farm very carefully, we use oak very subtly and of course, we’re fully organic. And that takes a great deal of work and it’s expensive to do, but I think it’s worth it. And I think we make, as a result, very interesting wines that are also healthy. They’re healthy to grow, because I don’t use round-up and all those sort of things that I really disapprove of. I think that’s reflected in the wine too. I think they’re a tonic."

Your most recent vineyard acquisition for Two Paddocks wine was the Fusilier in the Bannockburn sub-region. Which is right in what I understand they call the dress circle of Central Otago. Has that new vineyard, well relatively new, been an important addition for your fruit sourcing?

"I think it has, it’s a really good vineyard. I think it’s our biggest vineyard, because it’s six hectares. Which is quite big for us. You know, we have four very small vineyards. We’ve carefully converted it into organics. And I think we’re producing beautiful wines. We’re right next door to one of the more famous vineyards, which is Felton Road. We’re right on the Felton Road and we’re their neighbours and I’ve always liked their wines. I think it’s probably helped in some ways in the perception of our wines, because that’s a very sort of prestigious part of Central Otago. And our vineyard’s previously have always been on the margins. So, the first vineyard was called The First Paddock, it’s in Gibbston. That one I planted in ’93 and at the other extreme end there is The Last Chance. The first and the last. And The Last Chance is possibly the, it’s certainly one of the most southerly vineyards in the world. And they’re very different vineyards, but they’re at the outer limits of Central Otago. Not just geographically, but also in terms of their composition. The Last Chance is in a very arid, it’s sort of perched high above a valley. The First Paddock is a much wetter site, and cooler. In a great year it is quite astonishing. In fairness, that’s probably only one year in three. So it’s a very special vineyard, but very difficult. But the Fusilier is right in the centre of things and I did find early on that my wines weren’t really taken as seriously as I would like, given the seriousness that we… how we apply to things. And that’s because I think we were at those really exciting peripherals. But now that we’re right in the centre of things, I think critics and writers and so on take us a little more seriously than they did before. But I’m very pleased that we are the only producer that has holdings in those three great Central Otago valleys. And Viva la Difference."

When you talk about not being taken as seriously as you would like for your wine making, do you think your celebrity has played a part in that? Because I would imagine it’s a bit of a double edged sword. On the one hand you have the PR benefits of being a famous actor?

"I think that’s absolutely correct."

But that can also bring with it an element of cynicism among some people that maybe your wines aren’t the real deal?

"Yeah, yeah I think that’s a sort of prejudice that’s taken a while to overcome and there’s a couple of reasons for that. First of all there are so called “celebrities” who put their names on labels and someone else makes the wine. Or they buy a vineyard and it’s a kind of vanity project. But I’ve been at this for 27-years now, and I’ve been seriously involved in every aspect of my wine making. It’s become the other half of my life if you like. And there’s also that tendency… I cope it if I express a mild political view about something. I’ll get shouted down from all corners by people saying what would he know, he’s only an actor? So, there is a tendency not to take actors terribly seriously for whatever reason. I actually take actors quite seriously because most actors I know are actually very bright people and very amusing and knowledgeable, and you’ve got to be smart to be a good actor. So I know a lot of smart people in the work that I do. But if they have another interest, like if they’re a painted or they’re a wine maker, or whatever it is. They will have to overcome certain prejudices to have whatever they do taken seriously."

I guess that’s where blind tastings are quite helpful, because those prejudices can’t come into play?

"That’s certainly true, that’s certainly true. Now I’m getting 95 points from the Wine Spectator or 97 from James Suckling, you know, these sort of things. So now finally, I think we’re getting the recognition that we deserve."

And I understand you’ve done quite a lot of work on the farm to bring back the native birdlife?

"Yeah, I love birds and I’m also involved in various environmental causes. So it only makes sense that I would pay attention to the birdlife on my property. And not all birds are the same, of course. We have a lot of problems with starlings and so on, that want to you know, gorge themselves on our grapes. We have to net our grapes every year. But the native birds, which have been pushed out for one reason or another over the years, I’m very keen to get those back and I’ve spent a lot of time planting natives to attract the native birds back. And there were no native birds in the farm valley at all. But now we’re seeing Tui and Bellbirds and Fan Tails, Grey Warblers. All kind of native birds that hadn’t been seen in the valley for years. And they’re slowly coming back. I go to a lot of trouble to grow honey trees, so that there’s something for them to eat during the long winter months and we do have long winters there. Long, bitter winters. But that’s been immensely rewarding. We saw a native pigeon the other day, a Kereru. But my whole approach there is a holistic one. We use biodynamic techniques, we’re not religiously biodynamic. I have some doubts about Rudolph Steiner. You know, he was by no means right about quite a number of things. But he had some very sensible ideas and it’s very important for me that it’s a healthy place to live. A healthy place for my people to work. We have quite a few cattle, they’re really there for the composting, for the manure. We have all kinds of poultry and sheep as well. Not because they’re there for the meat, although I love a good leg of lamb on a Sunday. They are there for weed control as much as anything and we graze all these vineyards during the winter. Everything that we do there is a kind of holistic approach to wine growing. I have neighbours that spray everything with chemicals and so on, and I don’t like going near them. And I don’t particularly approve of their wines. Even though it’s a very troublesome business. Every vine on our vineyard’s is visited something like 14 or 15 times a year by a pair of hands. So it’s not just hand harvested, but these are hard grown wines. That’s a lot of work."

You’re obviously really dedicated to organic viticulture and putting environmental considerations first. Where did that ideology stem from?

"That was a sort of slow dawning really and I, it started off. I had a holiday job when I was a student and we were spraying gorse and other weeds around Southland. With what was then the equivalent of something like Agent Orange. I think it was called Toren. It was a terrible chemical you know, that just killed everything. You were supposed to wear masks and sort of hazard suits, and of course none of us had them. It’s amazing I’m still alive actually. But it was then that struck me that conventional farming, there was something terribly wrong with it. If you can kill cabbages from 20km away, if the wind is right, you’re not using something that’s… you know, it’s very short sighted. And the same thing struck me about agri-chemicals and I started to become interested in soil health. And it was actually quite difficult to establish vineyards initially, organically. So we started conventionally and gradually turned everything round, so it’s fully organic now and it’s been a long process. But a very rewarding one and I’m much happier about what we do and what we make. And what you drink, as a result of that. And I think that my legacy really is going to be these vineyards. No one’s going to remember the films that I’ve been in. There’s such a turnover of actors and what we do, that no one’s going to remember that. But these vineyards that I’ve established, these four vineyards, will live on long after me and I’d like to think that just as in Burgundy, people are growing wine on vineyards that were established by the Romans 2000 years ago. In 2000 years, if the planet is still alive, then these vineyards will still be famous in their own way."

You spoke earlier about your stylistic preferences for Two Paddocks wine. Does your winemaker, Dean Shaw, produce the wines to your brief or were your personal tastes both already aligned in that regard?

"I think it’s a combination actually because it’s… Dean and I have been making wine since ’99. We don’t really have to talk a great deal about things anymore, because he knows what I want. He knows what he should be doing and he’s really good. In addition to that, even before I was working with Dean; those first two vintages. I was using Larry McKenna from Escarpment Wines, whose Australian incidentally. And Larry comes down four times a year and wanders around the vineyards with me and Mike, my viticulturalist. And he’s in the winery with Dean. And he’s been absolutely fundamental to what we do as well. So Dean and I listen very carefully to what Larry has to say. And value it and I think that’s all been you know, wonderful for us."

Many people of my generation are sadly unable to taste Burgundy because it’s priced so far out of reach. How would you describe the stylistic differences, in comparison to new world pinot?

"Yes, that’s a difficult one. And it’s very difficult to give descriptors to pinot noir at all, because it is the most elusive of wines. I’m lucky in that I got to live in the UK for 10-15 years, back in the days when you could actually afford pinot. That was before the Americans discovered it and the Japanese, and they’re happy to spend a bit of money on a good bottle of wine. And now, sadly, its become increasingly unaffordable for that reason. But I could, when I first got to London in 1979/1980, I could get a Grand Cru for 30 quid, you know. Or at least a Premier Cru for 20 quid. So I drank it on a regular basis, because I’d found something I’d profoundly fallen in love with. And that’s what drew me to growing it when it was a marvellous discovery when I found that people were beginning to grow pinot noir in the area that I loved most in the world. I built a house in Central Otago in 1987 and soon after that, about 1991 pinots were beginning to become evident. There were three or four growers that were producing pinots that were really interesting, and I though if they can do it, then why can’t I? And that led me to planting my first grapes in ’93. Yeah it’s a shame about Burgundy. Some of the greatest wines in the world come from there. Wines that absolutely fascinate me. But I think to get a bottle of Burgundy that is equivalent to say one of our single vineyards, you need to spend about $300 or more to get that kind of quality from Burgundy."

Do you have much of a cellar of wine at home?

"I do, every three or four years when I remember I go and see my distributors, who also distribute Burgundy and I get them to… I leave it to them actually. I just say I’d like four or five cases of Burgundy, of pinots and the chardonnays. And you choose, and I’ll put them down. And then 10 years later I’ll wander down to the cellar and see what’s doing well. The wonderful thing that we’ve discovered, that we had no idea would be true, was that our wines would age gracefully as well. I mean, it was always thought that new world pinot’s, drink them young. But that is actually not true and it’s kind of sad that very few of us actually have cellars and it’s important to cellar your wine well. It has to be the right temperature and you know, the humidity has to be right and all that sort of thing. But 99.9% of us can’t actually afford to have a proper cellar, so very little wine actually that we drink is cellared. But it’s wonderful to pull out a 2010 Two Paddocks and see how its evolved into something extraordinary, different. And the same is true of our Rieslings. That was a big surprise to me, because I was really only growing Riesling and about 10% of what we produce is Riesling. It’s the only white we do. They also age. I don’t know why I was surprised really, because Riesling is a noble grape. And one of the things about noble grapes is that they are supposed to age and they will, if they’re treated right. So our Rieslings develop into something completely different. Unfortunately most wines, I think statistically are actually drunk within 20 minutes of purchase. So we do make a point of actually cellaring our wines, that will be sold later on. We have a wine club and occasionally we will offer some older vintages to our members and we get great feedback from that. And they would have been cellared properly."

So do your top tier wines need further cellaring upon release?

"We don’t release them until we think they are you know, singing so to speak. But if you can afford to do so, you will find it very rewarding to put them down. Even five years and see how they’ve evolved. I like the title of your podcast because wine is an adventure and one of the great adventures in wine is putting it down and being patient. Patience in all things."

I heard you say that winemaking is the only thing you’ve ever formed any ambition for. Which came as a surprise, given the success that you’ve had with acting.

"I’ve never really had any ambition as an actor and I still don’t. It’s always surprised me that I actually get work at all. And I hadn’t imagined that I’d be able to have a career as an actor. That was a surprise in itself. So every time I get another job, I’m as surprised as the first job I ever got. I never really wanted to be a movie star. I didn’t see the value in that. I love working in movies and I love being in them. I love working with movie people. But being a movie star, I can’t think of anything worse really. I mean, for instance now I’m in Central Sydney and I’m perfectly able to go down and buy a coffee around the corner and no one bothers me. But I’ve got friends, contemporaries, other actors who that would be very difficult. They’d need a body guard or I don’t know, all those trappings. All the nonsense that goes with being a star, I don’t have to worry about. So I can live a perfectly normal life and the same is true in New Zealand. I can go for a ride on my bike and no one troubles me. So I count myself very lucky that I’ve sort of got a good balance in my life. Nothing is too difficult. I’m successful enough for me. And that’s been very good and I feel very lucky. But with wine it was different. When I opened that first bottle of my pinot, from that first vineyard and I realised it was really good. About five minutes later I realised that very good wasn’t enough. I wanted it to be the very best. So those last 27 years have been about working towards absolute excellence. And everything we do is geared around that."

It seems to me that Two Paddocks wine has become more visible in Australia. Have you been expanding distribution over here?

"We actually sell more wine. I mean, we don’t make very much wine anyway. We’re tiny. But we sell more in Australia than we do in New Zealand. But then it’s a bigger market. We have good profile here and I’m very pleased to run into people who say oh, look I’ve been buying your wine for years and it’s my wife’s favourite and all that. So we’ve got a long, loyal following and that gives me great satisfaction."

Now you’re leaving to London next week, to go and shoot. Are you looking forward to getting back to work?

"I certainly am. I mean, it’s going to be interesting. We are the first big film I think out of the blocks. They’ve sent me a 100 page document, which concerns all the protocols that we will work under. But I can’t wait to get back to work and I feel actually really fortunate, because so many of my peers, my fellow actors and so on are unable to work at the moment. And I’m very, very concerned about that. Not just actors, but artists in general and the arts have been abandoned really. I don’t know what the future is for the performing arts, really. Because without an audience, I’m not quite sure what one does. So I’m very worried. And I’m also worried about the great institutions in this country, like the Sydney Theatre Company and the Melbourne Theatre Company and the Royal Australian Ballet. What happens? Nobody knows. So I’m very fortunate to be actually able to go to work at all. I’m well aware of that. I suppose there’s an element of being pioneers, you know. And anything can happen. But I’m confident that the studio will be doing everything in their power to keep everyone safe and keep the production on track. It will be great to be with Jeff Goldblum and Laura Dern again, who are good friends. And DeWanda Wise, who is someone I worked with last year, she’s terrific. And then there’s Chris and Bryce, I don’t know them but we’ve all been in contact and we’re all sort of a bit thrilled to get back with the dinosaurs. Because we’ve all been there before and it’s always been an enjoyable experience."

Do you see yourself continuing to do as much acting as you have been, in the future?

"I want to spend more time at the farm and that’s certainly my first priority once we’ve finished the film. But we won’t be done until October. I’ve just built myself a little house on the farm. I was previously living in what was an old seed shed and it’d be lovely to be around during the building process. But that hasn’t been possible. I always say look, I’m not going to work this year. I’m just going to be on the farm for a year. And I might just do that. I’ve been thinking about documenting a year in the life of the farm and perhaps doing a book. That might be fun. And take a year off acting. I did that two or three years ago, and we did the James Cook documentary. I didn’t act for a year, I spent that year either on the farm or in various parts of the Pacific and that was a fantastic year. So I’d love to do that again. But you know, you never know. I always say these things and then someone offers me a film in a place that I’ve never been before and I think oh what the hell, it sounds like an adventure. Let’s go."

I suppose you wouldn’t do it if you weren’t still enjoying it?

"Yes, I wouldn’t do it unless I loved it and I love going to new places. Meeting new actors and being in the company of film people, of other actors. That’s one of the best aspects of my life actually. I’ve been very fortunate in that respect."

Well Sam, thanks for taking the time to speak with us. It’s been a really enjoyable chat and I hope everything runs smoothly for you over in London.

"Thank you James, it’s been fun for me too."

About the winery

Two Paddocks - The First Paddock vineyard in Gibbston in winter

The Beginning

The Neill family already had wine history. In 1862, Sam Neill’s great-grandfather founded the general merchants Neill and Company in Dunedin. Neill’s father became manager after he left the army. "I grew up in a house that knew about wines and spirits," Neill says. "That was back in the days when New Zealand table wine didn’t really exist. The people who were growing grapes around Auckland were producing port and sherry - the sort of thing alcoholics live on. There was a small market for imported wines then, but New Zealand wine has revolutionised in my lifetime."

It was the cusp of a new decade, three or four years after the release of 1977’s Sleeping Dogs, the film that launched Sam Neill’s career, that he found himself in Europe with his friend, the English film star James Mason. While visiting Switzerland, Mason took Neill to what had apparently been Charlie Chaplin’s favourite restaurant, near Montreux on Lake Geneva. "We had a bottle of wine there that I found like nothing I’d experienced," Neill recalls. Before they opened it, Mason told him: "This is Burgundy boy, and don’t forget it." He never did.

"I became sort of obsessed with pinot noir and white and red Burgundy," Neill says. On a visit home to New Zealand during a stretch living in London, he visited Rolf and Lois Mills of Rippon winery in Wanaka. The pair produced a couple of vintages of pinot noir in the early 1990s which Neill says opened his mind to all kinds of possibilities. In 1992, Greg Hay of Chard Farm winery decided to develop land further down Gibbston Valley. He told Neill they planned to plant six vineyards, and that if he wanted to be involved, he could have his pick. "I thought, 'this is too good to be true'. I took 10 seconds to shake his hand," says Neill. "The idea I could grow my favourite wine in my favourite part of the world was an irresistible idea."

In 1993 Neill planted 2 hectares of pinot noir at a little vineyard at Gibbston, known as 'The First paddock'. At the same time, his friend Roger Donaldson (who directed Sleeping Dogs), planted the land next door, hence the name Two Paddocks. Roger's paddock proved to be a slow starter, which meant Neill had to go it alone; however, he kept the 'Two Paddocks' title. 

"I wanted to produce a good pinot noir that would, at the very least, be enjoyed by my family and friends. Frankly, my friends will pretty much drink anything, so this didn't seem too hard. To our great surprise, our first vintage in 1997 was much better than we hoped, in spite of a difficult growing season. 1998 was a more distinguished vintage, and in 1999 we were astounded to produce a pinot that was, we thought, world class. Here was a wine of considerable complexity with an amazing nose, delicious fruit and a good lengthy finish. 

The Expansion

After the first couple of vintages Neill decided to expand from that first site in Gibbston, acquiring 'The Last Chance' vineyard in the Alexandra district in 1998. This 2 hectare acre vineyard , located on a very beautiful terrace above the Earnscleugh Valley, was immediately planted with Pinot Noir - Burgundian clones 5, 6, 115, Able and 777. Perhaps the world’s most southerly vineyard, 'The Last Chance' name comes from an old gold miners watercourse that runs through the yard.

In 2000, Neill acquired Red Bank, a 60 hectare farm nestled between two dramatic rock escarpments at the other end of the Alexandra Basin. Red Bank, the largest vineyard at 5.6 ha, was planted mainly with Pinot Noir - clones 115, 10/5, 667, 777 and 114. Fruit from Red Bank usually forms the backbone of the Two Paddocks Estate Pinot Noir. The farm also houses the winery offices and staff quarters, the Private Paddock Club House and grows bounteous produce which include cherries, nectarines, saffron, lavender, truffles, vegetables, sheep, cumquats, walnuts, olives and eggs. 

The excellence of the wine from the tiny 'The First paddock' vineyard in Gibbston - it often became a single vineyard wine called Two Paddocks Proprietor's Reserve The First Paddock Pinot Noir - prompted Neill in 2008 to double the size of the Pinot Noir vineyard by planting another 2 hectares of Burgundian clones. 

In late 2013 Neill acquired his fourth vineyard, this time in Bannockburn. The 6 hectare 'The Fusilier' vineyard is located in the heart of what some call the "Dress Circle" of Central Otago wine, pretty much right next door to the esteemed Felton Road vineyard, and is planted solely to Pinot Noir. 

The acquisition of their vineyard in Bannockburn put Two Paddocks in the unique position of being the only Central Otago winery with a footprint in all three of Central Otagos great valleys, by owning vineyards in Gibbston, the Alexandra Basin and the Cromwell Basin. It demonstrates their faith and confidence in the future of New Zealand wine, Central Otago and in particular, Central Otago Pinot Noir.

The Gibbston vineyard was sold after being put on the market in 2021, but Two Paddocks still holds a long-term lease to manage and use the fruit from the land. Their intention is to buy another vineyard closer to the winery’s headquarters.