The Wine at a glance

The portfolio of Five Rows focuses on 6 main varietals that have been selected based on their unique style and expression of the Lowrey Vineyard, as well as their characteristic representation of the St. David's Bench Appellation. Pinot Noir accounts for the majority of our planting while Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Gris, Shiraz, Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc make up the remaining rows.

Through a focus on balanced vineyard management, thinning and hand work, our yields are very low, resulting in only small batches of wine being crafted. It's our belief that this concentration results in fruit and ultimately wine that is highly concentrated with the character of the terroir — the soil, minerality, local flowers and occasional tears in the pinot.

We hope you will enjoy our wine and explore the variability of the nature of the wine in the years to come. We wish to invite you to become engaged in the evolution of Five Rows — get to know us, our land and our wine because without you, there is no winery.

The Lowrey family has farmed the area for 5 generations. Current generations, Howard Lowrey and his son Wes Lowrey tend to the vineyard with a focus on achieving the most characteristic and complex examples that their varietals can produce.

Tasting

Due to the reality of crafting very small quantities of wine, we are limited to offer tastings on weekends between 11am - 5pm, May 1 to December 31 or during the week by appointment only. 

We’re currently able to provide tasting of our Pinot Gris, Sauvignon Blanc and Cabernet Sauvignon. It’s difficult for us to manage large groups and please no buses – when you get here you’ll see why.

We also encourage potential customers to visit our very supportive sommeliers and establishments. They are serving some of our releases that they consider to be signatures of our winery.

Purchasing Our Wine

To purchase any of our small releases, we recommend you contact us via phone or email. We try to encourage you to purchase in increments of cases of six because of the logistics of delivery and storage. It's also recommended that you cellar our reds to realize the full possibilities that our vintages have to offer over time.

We know that small batches of wine may sell out quickly so we welcome you to contact us about reserving your selections of upcoming releases.

wines@fiverows.com

You

Every person that we connect with through our winery is a partner and steward of Five Rows and we are forever appreciative of those who believed and invested in us through the wine. We invite all who have experienced our wine to register their unique bottle number and vintage release online with us - Here. This is simply a list of those individuals who have experienced our wine and the beginning of a long friendship through our craft.


Click here to register your bottle for our records

Current Vintages

Vintage
2010
Varietal
Shiraz
Vineyard
Lowrey Vineyards
Product of / Produit du Canada
Cases
103
Release Date
May 1, 2013
Price
$50/bottle
Tasting notes: It will be remembered as one of the warmest vintages Niagara has ever seen. The growing season started early and never slowed down. Precipitation was spotty but adequate - just perfect for wine grapes. We harvested the Syrah on October 11, much earlier than any other vintage. Sugar levels hit an all-time high (24°Brix) and the skins and seeds showed excellent maturity. Three rows were selected from the older Clone 100 block (#2,9,10) along with two rows from the younger Clone 7 block (#4,8).

The fruit was de-stemmed into bins, which were then sealed for a four-day cold soak on the skins. Fermentations were allowed to start wild, then inoculated with a yeast known as "Enoferm Syrah" (an isolate from the Côtes du Rhône in France). It was chosen for this ripe fruit because it’s known to be a good glycerol producer for smoother mouthfeel with typical aromas including violets, raspberries, cassis, strawberries and black pepper. Fermentations lasted about 8 days with temperature peaks around 28°C. I could tell early on that this wine would one day be something special!

Five barrels were filled following pressing. The Clone 7 fruit was racked to a new Taransaud barrel and a two-year-old Billon, while the Clone 100 fruit was split between two older French and one American oak barrel. The wine was allowed to mature in oak for 24 months. We bottled 118 cases of this Syrah on March 26th, 2013. This wine, along with all of our 2010 reds, is now available for purchase.

Alcohol: 13.4% Cellaring: 3-5 years
Vintage
2010
Varietal
Cabernet Sauvignon
Vineyard
Lowrey Vineyards
Product of / Produit du Canada
Cases
103
Release Date
May 1, 2013
Price
$50/bottle
Tasting notes: The 2010 Cab Sauv was harvested on October 28th and 29th. If we push it, Howie, Wilma and I can hand-harvest and process about 1.5 to 2 tonnes in a day. We normally tackle the Clone 169 block first, then bring in the Old Block Cab on day two. It's always a relief to get through these two days as the Cab Sauv is the last variety we harvest each year. Needless to say, we slept in on October 30th.

70 picking boxes were harvested from rows 4 and 13 in the Clone 169 Block and 78 boxes from rows 5 and 8 in the Old Block. Following a four-day cold soak, the two bins of fruit were inoculated and warmed to start fermentation. Two yeasts were chosen to work with the specific strengths of each vineyard. The slightly riper Clone 169 fruit was fermented with FX10, known to retain polyphenolic potential (structure and colour), release and bind polysaccharides, and aid in the expression of terroir through minimal "fermentation odour" production. The Old Block was inoculated with CSM, a yeast that specializes in producing intense aro­matic profiles of berries, spice and licorice, while concurrently reducing vegetal aromas. A winemaker can only hope that these yeasts live up to such bold claims!

Finished wines were racked to four barrels: Clone 169 to a new Taransaud and two-year-old Billon; Old Block to a two-year-old Taransaud and five-year-old DAMY. Through the years I've found that Taransaud barrels do magic for my Cab Sauv. They have a way of "framing" the fruit components of the wine, while contributing just the right amount of oak spice and wood tannin. I usually opt for a tight grain oak, medium toast level with three years of air drying to balance the longer time our red wines spend in barrel. After 24 months in oak, the 2010 Five Rows Cabernet Sauvignon was blended and allowed to bulk age in a tank for five more months. This wine is now available for purchase.

Aromas: blueberry, cherry, Stanley prune, mint.

Palate: soft tannin, ripe cherry, savoury mouthfeel/flavour.

Cellaring: I personally enjoy drinking this wine now (call it winemaker bias), but it should really be cellared for at least another six months. It has the tannin and structure to age and improve for many years to come, I prefer not to put a limit on it.

Alcohol: 13.3%
Vintage
2012
Varietal
"Jean’s Block" Riesling
Vineyard
Lowrey Vineyards
Product of / Produit du Canada
Cases
96
Release Date
May 1, 2013
Price
$25/bottle
Tasting notes: Our Clone 49 Riesling vines budded out very early in 2012, perhaps two weeks ahead of a normal year. Although this may sound advantageous, it was actually problematic. A sudden frost followed bud-break and many fragile buds were frozen dead. Luckily, we left an extra cane that could be tied down to add a few precious growing shoots to the sparse canopy. The summer growth period proceeded nicely with warm temperatures and little rain. A lighter crop load required less thinning and ripened quickly near the end of August.

Winery: The bulk of our Riesling is purchased by Fielding Estate Winery. In talking with Winemaker (and friend) Richie Roberts, I learned that he likes to harvest Riesling with fairly high acidity to give some vibrant life to the resultant wine. As a bit of a "Riesling rookie" myself, I decided to experiment with this approach and harvest our 2012 crop at a higher TA value than I normally would. We brought in our Riesling on September 13th (earlier than ever) and the pressed juice tasted beautiful! The higher TA meant a juice with lower pH, and consequently a sluggish start to the fermentation. Eventually, with the help of a little extra nutrient, the W15 yeast hit its stride and worked at a nice slow pace over the next month and a half. The fermentation was finally halted on Halloween at a specific gravity of 1.006, a point where I perceived balance on my palate. Over the winter months the wine was protein and cold stabilized prior to coarse filtration. We bottled 96 cases on March 26, 2013. The 2012 "Jean’s Block" Riesling is now available for purchase in our barn.

Alcohol: 12.0%
Vintage
2009
Varietal
Pinot Noir
Vineyard
Lowrey Vineyards
Product of / Produit du Canada
Cases
182 (7 barrels)
Release Date
May 1, 2012
Price
$50/bottle
Tasting notes: Sometimes the best of wines and the worst of seasons magically collide to create an unexpected moment of glory. The growing season of 2009 was one of those odd times. A late budbreak set the tone for what would be a cool, wet summer. We usually harvest Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris in early September, but nothing was close to being ripe in the late summer of 2009. Cue the blessing in disguise.

The moderate September days and cool fall nights helped move the Pinot ripening window to a time when Botrytis concerns were at a minimum. This was uncharted territory for Niagara Pinot growers. You must understand that there is one and only one certainty when growing Pinot Noir - they WILL rot at some point. When the inevitable did not happen in 2009, we were afforded the luxury of harvesting at the exact point when tannins, flavours, sugars and acids were aligned to my liking.

We chose to harvest Rows 1 and 2 on October 6, the latest Pinot pick we've had in 25 years. The remainder of the fruit was taken in on October 17. Average harvest parameters were 22.9°Brix, 8.4 g/L TA and pH 3.15. Fruit was destemmed and crushed into one tonne fermentation bins and allowed a cold soak at 10°C for five days. All bins were warmed to 14°C and inocualted with RC212 yeast at 250 ppm. Ferments averaged about 7 days, with a peak temperature of 29°C. Each bin was allowed to macerate post-fermentation until tannins showed signs of softening.

The wine was pressed and settled before clean-racking into seven French oak barrels (average age 2.5 years). Malolactic fermentation was carried out in oak. Barrels were racked and returned every 6 months. Total time in wood was 24 months before final blending in November 2011. 182 cases were bottled on April 2nd, 2012.

In my early tasting notes for this wine I have written, "something dark, alluring and mysterious about this Pinot. Reminiscent of a rainy day on our honeymoon spent tasting great Burgundies in the dank cellars of Beaune."

Aromas: cherry, violet, cassis, smoke, earth

Palate: dried cranberry, Bing cherry, soft tannin, haunting length

Cellaring: 2013-2019
Vintage
2009
Varietal
Cabernet Sauvignon Icewine
Vineyard
Lowrey Vineyards
Product of / Produit du Canada
Cases
109
Release Date
July 1, 2011
Price
$45/bottle
Tasting notes: At 8:03 AM on January 2nd, a new era began at Lowrey Vineyards. As the sun peeked over the escarpment we welcomed the dawn of our very own "Ice Age". After an evening of perfect freezing conditions (-12°C) it was decided to harvest five rows of specially selected Cabernet Sauvignon, our first foray into the world of Icewine. A beautiful morning unfolded before us, with a light snow gently filtering the weak rays of winter sun. It soon became clear that picking the fruit and braving the cold are the easy part, and actually quite enjoyable.

To understand the travails of pressing frozen grapes to yield minute amounts of juice, I want you to imagine trying to squeeze a tray of ice cubes in an effort to produce water. It takes equal amounts of pressure and patience I assure you!  Too much of the former and not enough of the latter can lead to problems… big problems. Less than a minute into the second press load I cranked up the pressure and was horrified to hear the sickening hiss of a slow leak in the press bladder.  Luckily we had a back-up bladder on hand, but the subsequent dismantling of the press load and bladder re-assembly really set us back. In the end, patience prevailed and the luscious Cab juice began to flow. It was thick, sweet and full of super-concentrated flavours of ripe strawberry and raspberry.

Technical Notes: This is a special icewine because it only endured a single press. Normally, multiple pressings take place with each successive squeeze getting lower concentrations of sweet juice and higher concentrations of water. Ultimately, these portions are all put together in a diluted final blend. Our "Single Press" netted only 280L of juice (39 degrees Brix) that was subsequently treated with pectinase enzyme then fermented in oak with EC118 at an inoculation rate of 350ppm. An older French oak barrel was used for the fermentation and aging regimen. The marathon ferment began January 29th and wasn’t stopped until June 21st at a specific gravity of 1.070.

The strength of this wine is its aromatic intensity and overall balance, with just the right amount of acid (TA 10.65g/L) playing off the sweet characters. Notes of Strawberry jam dominate the nose while subtle hints of white chocolate entice the palate.
To view our past vintages click here.