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Buy OnlineNew Zealand Organic Wine Awards 'Sustainable Vineyard of the Year' 2024
Winery notes (2022 Vintage)
"The Fusilier Vineyard is named in honour of Sam’s father, Major Dermot Neill, a soldier in the Royal Irish Fusilier Regiment for twenty years before returning home to Dunedin, New Zealand, where he ran the family Wine & Spirit business, Neill & Co. Planted entirely in 2000, The Fusilier is 5.6 hectares of pinot noir, on rolling northerly facing terraces at the western end of Felton Rd and bordered by the vineyard of the same name. Soils on the terraces consist of deep alluvial fans, which are made up of varying depths of silt, sand and gravel layering all derived from mountainous raw schist parent material.
Brooding, thoughtful, dark and intriguing aromatically, whilst bold the underlying core is elegant, fragrant and fresh. A gorgeous expression of this idyllic Bannockburn vineyard."
Rated Outstanding & 96/100 Cameron Douglas, November 2025 (2022 Vintage)
"There’s no mistaking the sense of site with this wine, the voice of place is clear [for me] with scents of floral perfumes and soft earth clay, a fine dried herb seam with layers of vanilla spice and sweet French oak. Taut and new still with tension from fine tannins and acid line, this holds the palate to allow the flavours of red berries, plum and wild black currant berries to add their voice and softness. Dry, plenty of fine textures and complexity. Lengthy and well made with best drinking from 2028 through 2038."
97/100 Susie Barrie MW & Peter Richards MW (UK), Susie & Peter New Zealand Wines of the Year 2026 (2022 Vintage)
"The Fusilier in question is Sam Neill’s father, Major Dermot Neill, a soldier in the Royal Irish Fusilier Regiment for 20 years before he returned home to Dunedin (New Zealand), where he ran the family wine and spirit business, Neill & Co. Sam Neill, although best known for his stellar acting career, started Two Paddocks as a wine passion project in 1993, assembling various vineyards in the southern and western parts of Central Otago, before adding this one, in more central Bannockburn, in 2013. The rolling north-facing terraces over alluvial silt, sand and gravel, typically give a darker-fruited expression of Pinot than some of the lighter Two Paddocks bottlings, exacerbated by a relatively warm vintage in 2022. Winemaking involved 82% whole bunch, wild yeast ferments in large-format oak, then a further 12 months of ageing in oak (23% new). The perfume is instantly attractive, with smoky, flinty red and black berry fruit and charred herb notes. On the palate, it’s tense and grippy, with chalky tannin – complex and long, with a wonderful flow and presence. It’s a wine with tremendous resonance and a light touch despite the complexity. As with the estate Pinot (see above), this wine just kept getting better the more we revisited it. Fabulous stuff."
