The 2016 Pier One Sydney Harbour NSW Wine Awards has announced the main trophy winners for this year’s awards.
Chair of judges for 2016, PJ Charteris commented on how the overall medal count was up again this year.
“The most exciting thing was seeing the diversity in region and variety. NSW winemakers are having a red-hot crack at producing high quality wines from old and new varietals and this is a tribute to the passion and strength of the NSW wine industry,” he said.
The presentation lunch was held at Pier One Sydney Harbour on Friday 28 October.
During the presentations, president of the NSW Wine Industry Association Tom Ward thanked all involved and commented on the high quality of judges involved in this year’s show.
“This year we continued the theme of going to the regions for judging. We were lucky enough to spend time in the Hunter Valley and I think this is an unique way of judging that exposes not only the judges to the region but also allows the region to get engaged with the show – we appreciate all the people that gave their time to assist in the event. I am happy to announce that next year we are looking to host the wine show in Mudgee and working with them to deliver another great experience,” said Ward.
This year, Central Ranges wines (which incorporates the regions of Mudgee, Orange and Cowra) were the big winners, with nine trophies, followed closely by the Hunter Valley with eight, and then the Southern Highlands and Hilltops also claiming well deserved accolades.
The champion of the awards was Windowrie Estate from the Cowra, who were awarded the ultimate title of ‘Pier One Sydney Harbour 2016 NSW Wine of the Year’ for their 2015 ‘The Mill’ Shiraz.
The winning Shiraz was described by PJ Charteris as “a wine that expresses its beautiful fruit first and foremost. It is great to see fruit and distinctive varietal fruit character as the defining features of a wine”.
Bruce Tyrrell was awarded with the Graham Gregory Award for services to the NSW wine industry. Minister for Primary Industries and Minister for Lands and Water Niall Blair MLC presented the award to Tyrrell, commenting on his many years of hard work within the industry.
“I look forward to the year ahead and am optimistic that we have an industry that is heading forward. I will leave you with some numbers to support that optimism; shipments from NSW-based wine exporters increased by 8% to $487 million in the 12 months ended September 2016. This represented additional revenues of $35 million over the year,” said Ward.