Hawke's Bay Vineyards

In the 1970s and 80s, being innovators in viticulture and sensing the transformation that was about to take place in the quality and awareness of New Zealand wine, the family purchased premium grape growing land in the favoured Hawke's Bay region and started planting classical varietal vines. Over the years the family-owned vineyards have grown steadily in size and number.

The sunny Hawke's Bay vineyards enjoy a superb mix of microclimates and varying soils: silt, shingle and clay, fertile deposits over gravelly sub soils - these are all deposited by the rivers and streams which drain freely from the rugged inland ranges in the west. Our winemakers are able to blend ripe fruit from different locations to achieve wines of true regional harmony and character.

Hawke's Bay is New Zealand's second largest wine region, and is known for its diversity of soils - each having a significant impact on the flavour profiles of the fruit. Temperatures in the region also vary but are generally are warmer than Burgundy and cooler than Bordeaux. In sites away from coastal influences such as the Heretaunga Plains, temperatures are slightly warmer. The Hawke's Bay typically produces fuller and riper wines than those of Marlborough and is an ideal climate for the full ripening of the Merlot variety.

With the exception of the flat Heretaunga Plains, the majority of the Hawke's Bay is rolling countryside, ascending inland to over 1600 metres to the Ruahine & Kaweka Ranges. The Ranges are a significant influence in Hawke's Bay, not only providing shelter from the prevailing Westerly winds but importantly providing a myriad of soils across the region.

Hawke's Bay once lay on the seabed. Beginning about 5 million years ago, and continuing to the present day, plate tectonic movement along the backbone of New Zealand caused uplift of the greywacke rock, to form mountains, which included the Ruahine ranges. The 'building' and subsequent erosion of the Ruahine Ranges and Kaweka Ranges has been carried over the centuries by meandering rivers and streams, namely the Tukituki, Ngaruroro, & Tutaekuri rivers, to the flat land below. In the process the erosion was abraded, creating a patchwork of soils across the region, consisting of rounded gravel, sand, silt, and clay. The Taupo eruption in the central North Island more than 1800 years ago is understood to be the largest eruption the world has known in historic times. This deposited pumice and ash over most of the North Island and evidence of this can be found over much of the soils in the Hawke's Bay region.

Delegat's plantings of Merlot are the most significant in Hawke's Bay. The older Merlot vines are planted in the renowned Gimblett Gravels area on our Highway 50 and Gimblett Road vineyards. Planting of our Crownthorpe Vineyard started in 2001 and now this is the largest single vineyard planting in the Hawke's Bay wine region. This terraced vineyard is situated on the spectacular cliff facing the Ngaruroro River and bounded to the north by the Kikowhero Stream.