Villa Maria appoints new group chief winemaker

Nick Picone has spoken of Villa Maria’s organic ambitions and the rare white grape used in its low-alcohol rosé following his appointment as new group chief winemaker.

Nick Picone becomes group chief winemaker at Villa Maria after 18 years with the company (Photo: Villa Maria)

Speaking to the drinks business following his appointment, Picone emphasised Villa Maria’s increasing emphasis on organic winemaking – with around 30% of the group’s vineyards now managed organically – and a growing organic wine range in New Zealand which, he hinted, could soon be targeted at international markets.

Villa Maria’s first organic releases, two Merlots, on the New Zealand market were from the 2009 vintage. The range has since grown to encompass a high-end premium Merlot, Syrah, Sauvignon Blanc at three levels, Pinot Noir at two levels, a Verdelho and a Gewürztraminer.

Picone said the group was considering rolling out an organic range in international markets, including the UK.

“We are certainly investigating international markets,” he said.

“Organic regulations and requirements are different in almost every market but with UK appearing reasonably in line with NZ, I don’t suspect that would pose us any issues. We already have an extensive portfolio on offer in the UK so need to evaluate where the opportunities lie.”

Picone also emphasised the group’s growing commitment to organic viticulture, with 30% of its vineyards now managed organically.

“Excitingly, practices from our organic vineyards are being rolled out to other sites, so even if the resulting wine is not labelled organic more and more of our vineyard management is becoming this way,” he explained.

“It’s part of our sustainability focus and we proud to be walking the talk, ensuring the health and vitality of our soils and vineyards will help keep Villa Maria in great shape to continue making high quality wine well into the future.”

The winemaker also revealed the company’s first foray into the so-called ‘lifestyle wine’ market with the release of its “Lighter” range of lower alcohol wines, including a Lighter rosé blend of merlot and, unusually, the relatively rare white Italian grape Arneis.

The lighter side of wine

Villa Maria’s new Lighter series of wines include a Pinot Grigio with an ABV of 9.5% (Photo: Villa Maria)

“The challenge with making a low-alcohol style from red varieties like the Merlot found in our rosé is achieving physiological ripeness at low sugar levels, and moving flavours past the under-ripe herbaceous characters,” he said.

“Arneis ripens at relatively low sugar levels and contributes interesting floral characteristics to the rosé blend, helping to balance out the aromatics without imparting to much of an obvious white wine character. We find it works well, adding charm and delicacy.”

Rather than use technology to remove alcohol after vinification as other producers, such as Australian Vintage, have chosen to do, Villa Maria achieves its reduced ABV by picking earlier before sugar levels rise.

“You have to be careful because some low alcohol wines also have high sugar, which adds calories,” Picone explained. “We’ve tried to get our wines so that they’re 25% lower alcohol and lower calorie than our standard range of wines.

“The biggest challenge is getting that full flavour development at the lower sugar levels and that’s where a big part of our research has gone into, is the vineyard manipulation, particularly around canopy management and also restricting berry size.

“In the winery a lot of the focus is on yeasts and on identifying strains of years which are less efficient at converting sugars into alcohol.”

Though well aware of the work still to be done in this nascent category, Picone said he was encouraged by the results so far – both for Villa Maria and for New Zealand wine.

“It’s fairly early days,” he said. “It’s going to take us a while to get there; with the research, it’s going to be over at least five years if not longer the way the programme has been stepped out, so we don’t expect we’ll just get there over night, but in the meantime we have low alcohol wines on the market and they are being picked up.

“Back in New Zealand, in fact, the government is funding research in to the development of low alcohol wines and Villa Maria is part of that research group. It’s seen that New Zealand has the opportunity to be a category leader in the low-alcohol or lifestyle wine segment. So in New Zealand its actually a fast-growing category – and we see a lot of potential here in the UK.”

Marlborough’s ‘tremendous’ 2015 

On the more established side of Villa Maria’s output, Picone revealed the first glimpse of Villa Maria’s 2015 Private Bin Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc, The wine represents a massive 50% of the company’s total volume.

The Marlborough region, with its two main grape growing valleys – the slightly warmer Wairau Valley (giving passion fruit, gooseberry, slightly smoky, pungent, “sweaty armpit” aromas, Picone said) and the cooler Awatere Valley (“more methoxypyrazine, herbaceous, green notes”) – is by far Villa Maria’s main vineyard area, with Sauvignon Blanc accounting or 75% of total production, most of which is from vineyards in this region. Both regions have produced excellent fruit in 2015, Picone said.

“We’ve had a tremendous season in Marlborough this year. [We’ve had] naturally very low yields for the Sauvignon Blanc [following] 2014, which was naturally a higher yielding vintage. I think you’ll see the wines this year have more concentration, more intensity of aromatics – those really pungent, gutsy, crisp, herbaceous characters.”

On the other end of the scale is a region which demonstrates something of Villa Maria’s versatility and willingness to invest in less well known areas. Gimblette Gravels is a small winegrowing area, 800ha, in Hawkes Bay which is essentially defined geographically by free-draining gravelly soils.

First planted in the 1980s, it is a region that is known for ripening Bordeaux varietals very effectively. Villa Maria controls vineyards in 40% of this highly valued area.

“To use Gimblette Gravels on the label, 95% of the fruit must come from that area,” Picone explained. The wines show more finesse and balance than heat – stylistically closer to Bordeaux than, say, Australia with its riper fruit. There’s more varietal character, lower alcohol, less dry tannic structure. It also ages well.”

A family affair

Picone’s new role as group chief winemaker for Villa Maria does comes after 18 years working with the group. Having started “pretty much straight from school” as a cellar hand in the Esk Valley winery – part of Villa Maria’s family of brands – Picone has climbed the ladder steadily, finally being promoted to the top job in June this year following the departure of Alastair Maling MW to Foley Family Wines.

“I’ve had quite some time around the company, working with the people and working with the vineyards,” Picone explained during a meeting at with the drinks business on his first trip to the UK in his new role, “so I have a fairly good foundation coming into this.

“I’ve been effectively making most of the North Island wines for a number of years now anyway, so I see it as ‘business as usual’ to an extent.

“My role is slightly different to my predecessors in that we have had a bit of a restructure and my role is staying very closely linked to the winemaking process and not to become too commercial and too involved with the business side of it.”

Villa Maria owner George Fistonich describes Picone as one of New Zealand wine’s ‘shining stars’ (Photo: Villa Maria)

New Zealand’s largest wholly family-owned winery and fifth-largest producer overall, Villa Maria has made huge strides since in 1961, at just 21 years of age, owner George Fistonich leased five acres of land from his father in Mangere, Auckland.

Throughout the 1960s Villa Maria was a one-man band, with Fisonich’s wife, Gail, supporting him in his venture. It was in the early 1970s the Fisonich took on staff and the company’s expansion really began.

Today, Villa Maria employs more than 250 permanent staff and exports wine to more than 60 countries, working with no fewer than 26 grape varieties. Its portfolio includes Vidal Estate, Esk Valley, Te Awa Collection and Thornbury in addition to its flagship Villa Maria brand.

Picone, 37, has been with the company since 1996. After growing up in Hawke’s Bay, he took his first wine job at Esk Valley before moving to first Marlborough and then Auckland, where he oversaw the group’s winemaking operations in this region, as well as Hawke’s Bay and Gisborne.

He has also worked a vintage at GD Vajra in Barolo and completed two harvests at DeLoach Vineyards in California.

On Picone’s appointment, company owner George Fistonich said: “Nick is an extremely talented winemaker with an exceptional palate and has demonstrated a natural ability with wine right from the start of his career.

“I’m proud to have seen Nick develop his skills over the years working in all of our winemaking regions. He is without a doubt one of the New Zealand wine industry’s shining stars.”