Est Wines 'Blanc' Pinot Noir 2024

From the personal cellar of Meredith Bell, the visionary behind Oregon’s Statera Cellars, comes the 2024 Est Wines Blanc. A breathtaking "white" Pinot Noir that prioritizes soul over pigment. While Bell is renowned for her technical precision with Chardonnay, Est serves as her private exploration of a single place: the Leland Vineyard. Planted in 1982, these forty-two-year-old organic vines dig deep into volcanic Jory soils, offering a sense of grounded history that Bell captures through a "quiet act of transformation."

The winemaking here is a study in extreme restraint. To achieve its luminous golden hue, the hand-harvested Pinot Noir was whole-cluster pressed with the lightest possible touch, keeping only the earliest, purest fraction of the juice separate to avoid any color bleed from the skins. After settling overnight, the wine was fermented and aged for 13 months in neutral French oak. The result is a wine of immense transparency and texture; a liquid conversation between winemaker and land that has been evolving since the early '80s. With only 72 cases produced, this is a rare, meditative glimpse into one of the Willamette Valley’s legacy sites.

• Producer: Est Wines
• Region: Willamette Valley, Oregon
• Varieties: Pinot Noir
• Alcohol: 13%