Villa Maria challenging Bordeaux with $85 Hawkes Bay Cabernet

Villa Maria, a New Zealand winery with a track record stretching back more than half a century, is for the first time aiming to take on high-end Bordeaux with a Hawkes Bay Cabernet Sauvignon priced at more than $85 a bottle. The inaugural 2013 vintage, comprising 97 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and three per cent Merlot, comes from the Gimblett Gravels region of Hawkes Bay on the east coast of New Zealand’s North Island, the prime vineyard area for Bordeaux-style varietals.