Driftwood Artifacts Margaret River Sauvignon Blanc 2025

When done well, the complex side of Sauvignon Blanc – the wooded fumé side – can reveal a complexity that can often evade the grape variety sans oak. This is one such example. The addition of 15% Semillon goes some way towards taming some of the grape’s über herbaceous-ness, too, as you warm to a wine offering citrus, apple, pear, laid back herbal notes with grass, hay and a touch of lemongrass, ginger. Neatly textured with citrus and fruits and a light savoury influence, lemon rind and Semillon-strong hay characters, this is undoubtedly a wine of some depth and seriousness. Wild fermentation in French barrique and puncheon (42% new) followed by a further six months maturation contributes its role, and it is beautifully executed, too.  

Jeni Port

Wine critic at Winepilot

Jeni Port is one of Australia’s top wine communicators. Based in Melbourne, Jeni created the first wine column in the (then) Sun News-Pictorial before moving over to The Age and becoming that paper’s longest-serving wine writer. Over the years she has written for most Australian wine magazines and these days calls WinePilot home. She is also a Tasting Panel member on the Halliday Wine Companion. She was named Wine Communicator of the Year and Legend of the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival in 2014 and in 2018 Legend of the Vine. She is a founding board member of Australian Women In Wine and is the co-deputy chair of Australia’s Wine List of the Year Awards and China’s Wine List of the Year Awards.

Wine writer and critic