Designation (English) for a delimited area within a larger vineyard. The term is mainly used in English-speaking wine regions such as Australia, New Zealand, the USA and South Africa. A block is roughly equivalent to single vineyard, but is usually smaller and more clearly defined. The demarcation is usually based on standardised criteria such as soil type, slope, exposure, grape variety, year of planting or clonal material.
While the term Lage or single vineyard (also Riede in Germany and Austria ) used in the German-speaking world usually refers to a geographical unit defined by wine law, a block is an internal subdivision without mandatory legal requirements. A block can in turn be subdivided into even smaller parcels, which often correspond to individual rows or particularly homogeneous sections.
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Thorsten Rahn
Restaurantleiter, Sommelier, Weindozent und Autor; Dresden