2015 Leeuwin Estate Chardonnay Art Series Margaret River Australia 750 ml

One of the World’s Best Does It Again

Any legitimate discussion about the world’s best Chardonnay has to include a handful of names. On the West Coast, it’s Kongsgaard, Kistler, Aubert, and Ramey. In the Côte de Beaune, it’s Comtes Lafon, Ramonet, Coche-Dury, LeFlaive, and Latour (And DRC, if you can even find a bottle of their Montrachet). In Australia, however, there’s only one name: Leeuwin.

Year after year, Leeuwin’s Art Series Chardonnay ranks among the best in the world. This one, the 2015 Leeuwin Estate Art Series Chardonnay, was ranked #38 on Wine Spectators Top 100 Wines list in 2018, and was #4 among all Chardonnays anywhere thanks to its symphony or ripe peach, nectarine, and citrus balanced by oak and an incredible, creamy texture. 

Located a stone’s throw from the Indian Ocean, in arguably the most remote wine region in the world—it’s more than a full day’s journey to get to Margaret River, including a three-hour drive after flying to Sydney and then connecting to Perth!—Leeuwin has been setting the standard for as long as we can remember. Even within their clamored-for portfolio of wines, the “Art Series” is widely considered to be the best white in Australia, and regularly captures a spot on the annual Wine Spectator Top 100 list.

No wonder: Everything that Leeuwin does is geared toward maximizing quality…which, as always there, trumps quantity. Yields are kept to a minimum so that small bunches retain tremendously concentrated fruit. From the vineyard to the winery, no effort is spared in the pursuit of excellence. Australia’s leading critic, James Halliday, has called Leeuwin Estate, “a class act…[that works] with the precision of a Swiss watch. It stands at the very forefront of estate-based, family-owned wineries.” Even Robert Mondavi, after he singled out Margaret River more than 45 years ago as ideal for fine wine production, provided early mentorship to the Horgan family.

All of that early potential has come to fruition with the 2015…and then some. Wine Spectator praised it as “elegant” and “lingering” in their 95-point review, “with precision to the nutmeg, lemon curd, verbena and mandarin orange flavors, which are intense and harmonious.” James Halliday, the dean of Australian wine writers, rated it 96 points for its generosity “of flavour and texture, imparted by Leeuwin's stamp of extended skin contact…White peach and nectarine notes are strung pitch perfect across scales of clotted cream oak and juicy acidity.” And as far as the age-worthiness of the Art Series Chardonnay goes, he wrote, “I have had older vintages reminiscent of top Meursault.” High praise, indeed.

The 2015 is yet another proud entry into that vinous pantheon, a worthy successor to the critically praised and commercially clamored-for bottlings that came before it, and a stunning monument to the winery and the vintage in its own right.