La collina is a super-premium syrah with fans around the world, as wine writer Timothy Giles explains.

“Are you sure you’ve poured the right wine?”

I was about to taste 17 wines. Every vintage of a rare, super-premium, Hawke’s Bay red, la collina. A visionary New Zealand wine and a world-class syrah.

I was excited, wouldn’t you be? I was also convinced that my pourer had put the wrong wine in my glass. First up was the 2002. I hadn’t tasted it yet. But it didn’t look right.

A 23-year-old red wine should show obvious signs of age. The bright pink and inky purples of a young red, fade over the years. Bold red, softens to resemble sun-wearied brickwork. Inky intensity slips into a rusty auburn. Deep youthful colour, becomes opaque. Tell-tale signs of the fragility in a wine nearing its time.

But the pourer was right. The 2002 la collina was in my glass. Created in 2002, but looking as bright and perky as a pilates instructor born in that same year. A surprisingly youthful tribute to the brilliance of the wine and its makers, Lorraine Leheny and Warren Gibson. Partners in love, parenthood and Bilancia, the winery they formed, in part, to make la collina.

On the hill

La collina means “the hill” and refers to one specific hillside site in Hawke’s Bay. A vineyard slope, perfectly aligned to the sun and maritime aspect for grape-growing. A very steep slope, not suited to labour-saving machinery. The labour came primarily from Lorraine and Warren.

“We bought the land in 1997 and we really we got to know it planting the vines. It was back-breaking. Without the help of family, it would not have happened,” says Lorraine.

The vineyard covers around three hectares, mostly syrah, some two thousand vines with eight rows of exotic white grapes. Each planted by hand, converting grazing pasture to vineyard.

“Planting took place over three years, 1998, 1999 and 2000, as funds allowed. We started out with more enthusiasm than money.”

They also had ambition to make a landmark red wine – a world-class syrah. Which, Lorraine recalls, they launched at a premium price.

“When we first released la collina it was $80 a bottle and people were saying to us, ‘wow you must be pretty confident.’ I’m not sure we were confident, but we did mean to try and make a statement, to be fair.”

La collina has made a lasting and global statement. Wine-Searcher, a website collating scores from the most influential single critics to respected wine publications, ranks la collina (across it’s last four vintages) at 95-98/100.

Any wine ranked at 95-100, is defined as “classic: a great wine.” There is no higher ranking.

   

Great value

Among the very few wines in the world that achieve this ranking, la collina is exceptionally good value. They may have launched at a “confident” price point, but as Lorraine muses “in the 20 years since, it’s only gone up a hundred bucks a bottle.”
So how does it perform as an investment, should you rush out and buy some today?

The secondary or auction market is perhaps the best indicator of a wine’s investment potential. I asked Reece Warren, managing director of Australasia’s most reputable wine auction house, The Wine Auction Room, for his view on the market value of la collina.

Reece said: “la collina doesn’t come to market often. When it does, it always commands great prices. People are looking for this wine, and they are prepared to pay good money for it. The difficulty is that people who buy this wine, rarely re-sell it: they buy it, they cellar it, they drink it.”

Understandably. If you can find a better wine at the current release price of $170 (bilancia.co.nz), then this writer desperately wants to know about it.

That 2002 is an astonishingly fine wine. So, you can’t secure it at auction, should you buy the current release?

   

Current release

The 2024 la collina, is ranked at an astonishing 98+/100 by both wine writer, Erin Larkin, for Robert Parker, and James Suckling. That’s the highest of praise.

But it’s rare. la collina is made in very small amounts, and the challenge Lorraine says, is to allocate the wine equitably, for an increasingly global demand.

“La collina is always a really limited amount and we are committed to a certain quality. Some years we have left the grapes unpicked. Others we’ve made wine, but not la collina, if we didn’t believe the quality was going to be there.”

In fact, in the 24 years between the first (2002) and current release (2024), seven vintages passed with no la collina released.

The winemaking and marketing strategy align, Lorraine explains, and are behind the reputation Bilancia has for exceptional wine.

“The idea is to have the one wine that sets an expectation of our wines. The attention coming from la collina creates interest in the wines we are producing at slightly greater volumes. That’s also where our future is, I am partial our single vineyard chardonnays and the uvaggio.”

The strategy is working. While most wineries compete for the attention of distributors, especially to export, Lorraine admits the distributors just come to them.

“We have been very fortunate that way. Most of our wine sells domestically, but we do sell to Australia, a bit in the UK, Germany. We’ve just opened up South Korea, China.

“A New York company has just put in an order and we are excited. Now I just have to be fair in my allocations. It can be a headache when, in some vintages, we only have a few hundred cases to release. Fortunately, there is a bit more of the 2025 coming, so hopefully we can keep everyone happy.”

First in line are established buyers. “Not everyone buys wine every year and I don’t expect them to, but people who’ve bought la collina should, I think, get the first chance to buy our new release. So, they get an email a day or two before
we release.”

These proven buyers, also get the opportunity to be hands-on in the making of the wine.

“We’ve built this group of people, customers, friends and family who come in and pick grapes on a weekend morning. We start about 8am and knock off at 1:30pm, lunchtime. Share some food, taste some wines, share stories.”

Lorraine smiles more telling this story than she has in discussing all their achievements and accolades since creating Bilancia. Like la collina, says Lorraine, this fulfils a long-time aspiration.

“We get to have a lot of fun and have a community involved, making our wines with us. I love that Warren and I can create that. It’s something I experienced in my first job as a winemaker and always wanted to do. Now we have and its only taken 30 something years!”

Bilancia winery is a true labour of love for owners Lorraine Leheny and Warren Gibson. A hilly site on their Hawke’s Bay property provides the ideal conditions for growing their celebrated la collina syrah – the couple developed this section of land themselves, as it was too steep for machinery. Friends and family enjoy working at the winery.

About Bilancia

“Bilancia” means balance or Libra. Founded in 1997 by Warren Gibson and Lorraine Leheny (Librans), 2025 is Bilancia’s 29th vintage.

Winemaking resume

Warren: Australia (Margaret River and South Australia), Hungary, Italy, France, and California.
Lorraine: Australia (Yarra Valley and Margaret River), Portugal (Douro Valley), California, Auckland (Delegat).

La collina “the hill”

Planted from 1998 on steep, terraced, northwest-facing slopes on Roy’s Hill. First vintage was 2002, released in 2004. Current 2024 release marks the 20th anniversary.

Bilancia wines to seek out:

Tiratore single-vineyard chardonnay
Italian meaning sharp-shooter/marksman, named for the many bullet casings found when planting the vineyard. Current release 2021 is aptly taut and focused and rich. $90.

Uvaggio
Uvaggio meaning field blend/field wine. From la collina vineyard, eight rows of interplanted viognier, marsanne and roussanne are hand-harvested and co-fermented. Characterful, intriguing and seductively distinctive. Current release 2021. $90.

The Wine Room December auction has a small amount of la collina. Individual bottles of 2008, 2009 and 2013 and single four pack of 13. Reserve is just $100.