On cl o ud i w ne
“I love it when people come to Marlborough for sav blanc, but I love it even more when they go away with something different.”
In any game of word association, Marlborough and sauvignon blanc must rank in the same league as gin and tonic, or Elton and John. Tucked in the north-east corner of New Zealand’s South Island, the region has become synonymous with the grapes that have put it on the global viticultural map.
It’s impossible to underestimate the power of this symbiosis. A lightbulb moment in the 1970s spawned a regional industry that now produces more than three-quarters of New Zealand’s grapes, and 86 per cent of the national harvest is sauvignon blanc, which thrives with Marlborough’s long sunny days, loamy soils and low rainfall.
“It’s impossible to escape it in these parts,” says Margaret Sutherland, of the organic, family-run Dog Point Vineyard. “So many people work in the wine industry that locals call it two degrees of separation.”
From the air, the staggering
