Vininspo! podcast

Some people don’t even believe there’s a vineyard there, let alone the site that spawned a second coming for one of the country’s most hallowed cool-climate regions. Reg Egan was working as a lawyer when he decided to plant a vineyard in the Yarra Valley in 1963. The site he chose was not far from his Melbourne practice—so close, in fact, that he was sure he’d have to sell it in the medium term. H...

Julian Langworthy first struck me as the embodiment of happy-go-luckiness. A healthy irreverence, ready quip and loud laugh were standard issue, and he seemed to be breaking and losing more trophies than anyone else was winning. I was the Victorian chair of Wine Communicators of Australia when Julian’s 2014 Deep Woods Estate Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon won the Jimmy Watson Memorial Trophy at the Me...

I vividly recall my first meeting with Kathleen Quealy. I had tasted and delighted in her Pobblebonk field blend of Friulano, Riesling and Pinot Gris, and followed it up with the Rageous red, an unlikely marriage of Sangiovese, Shiraz and Pinot Noir. Among the Mornington Peninsula’s calm little sea of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, these outlandishly named, labelled and assembled interlopers smacked o...

Not starting with an end in mind has led this English-born, multi-award-winning writer to unearth profound connections down labyrinthine rabbit holes. Max Allen is too young to be deemed a national treasure, but that’s what he is. In a field where the esteem in which commentators are held is generally a measure not of perspicacity or originality but of perceived influence on potential sales, Max’s...

It makes sense when you meet Steve Lubiana that he was up to his chin in grape skins from the moment he could walk, snapping at the heels of his winemaker dad. There’s barely a moment when Steve isn’t playing with plants, fermenting stuff or pouring drinks to try with food. I first met Steve and his wife Monique, who is just as much a part of Stefano Lubiana, in Milan, of all places. They were loo...

I told Gwyn Olsen when I first met her that I somehow expected her to be stern. It wasn’t the first time she’d heard that—apparently, it’s how she’d come across in photographs in the wine press. In reality, she is anything but; sharp, warm and witty, I was intrigued by how her mind worked, and how that feeds into what she creates. I first heard of Gwyn during what seems like her breakthrough year...

Geoff Weaver is a man from another time—a world of steam trains and horse-and-cart milkmen—yet his pristine, cool-climate white wines hold their own with the best of the modern Australian wine scene. I’ve got to know Geoff pretty well over the years, thanks to my role with his distributor, CellarHand , which gets a mention in this conversation as the importer of Mosel estate Dr Loosen. I have inte...

Rob Mann has gone a long way to get back where he started; he's a forward-thinking high-achiever with a strong sense of self who's working extremely hard to efface any notion of ego or fashion from the wines he grows. His wines are produced under the Corymbia label, which he runs with his wife, Genevieve. Gen is a gem; she shies away from the limelight but is an exceptionally intelligent, sensitiv...

Crawford River is off the beaten track—on the road to nowhere, as Bee Thomson puts it—yet lovers of elegant, soulful, deftly balanced wines make a beeline to this second-generation label because they know precisely what it stands for. Much of the credit goes to Bee’s worldly parents, John and Catherine Thomson. John was the visionary who planted the vines in Condah in what is now southwest Victori...

This is the story of Gembrook Hill. All the context is in the story. It’s a long article , addressing perhaps my frustration with the shallowness of much so-called storytelling around wine. This is just a second-generation estate in a wine region whose modern era only dates back 60-odd years. And yet there is so much richness of consideration, camaraderie, aspiration and endeavour wrapped up in it...

This is the story of Vaughn Dell and Linda Morice, written towards the end of 2024. If you’d prefer to read it, you can do so here . All the context is in the story. It’s dear to my heart; I hope you’ll listen. Please leave a comment to share your thoughts on the piece and this format of delivery. In the meantime, thanks for tuning into Vininspo!—I look forward to bringing you most podcast episode...

I got to know David Lloyd when he was living on his beautiful Eldridge Estate in Red Hill, a few kilometres up the road from where I live on the Mornington Peninsula. A fellow journalist on a trade magazine I’d been freelancing for suggested I contact him because I was scouting around for some vineyard experience. David was a good bloke, excellent winemaker and could do with a hand, he said. This...

Kim Chalmers wears many hats, not least in a family business that serves as vine nursery, grape supplier and wine estate with vineyards in two separate geographical indications (GIs). She’s also wife to a winemaker and mother of two daughters, as well as serving on numerous committees. “History is made by those who turn up,” she says—and she turns up every time, full of enthusiasm. Bruce and Jenni...

There’s no challenge too steep for this brainiac entrepreneur viticulturist who likes to do things differently—and he’s certainly not done with redefining world-class New Zealand. Ambition is something Steve Smith can’t get enough of. He saw it in revolutionary viticulturist Richard Smart, who taught him to think. He saw it in Robert Mondavi and other doyens of the Napa Valley. He saw it in Sir Ge...

Tim Shand is not one to follow the flock. In a world where yes-men get ahead and homogeneity wins widespread acceptance, his contrarian nature hasn’t always gone down well. But an impulse to challenge conventional wisdom and see through mediocrity has made him stand out from the crowd in the long run—and earn a shot at fulfilling a prodigious potential. I got to know Tim well when he was chief win...

His 19th-century forebear sold a bank to buy vineyards, so deeply did he believe in the beauty and promise of a red slab of ancient slated desert sand above the River Rhine. Make no mistake: Johannes Hasselbach is fully invested—even if there was a time when he might have wondered what on earth his great-, great, great, grandfather was thinking when he sold the family bank in 1890 to buy vineyards...

From McLaren Vale to Marlborough, straight-shooting natural farmer Anna Flowerday has walked the walk with “vine Jedi” husband Jason—all the way to the title of NZ Vigneron of the Year. “Wines made with cowshit not bullshit” went the famous tagline at Te Whare Ra (TWR), the Marlborough estate Anna runs with her husband, Jason. It’s apt in so many ways: the indelicate language, the allusion to the...

A discernible warmth always manages to seep through Christina Pickard’s writing, and it does nothing to lessen the import of her output, which is serious, considered and searching. The affection is infectious. Christina is based in the Hudson Valley in her native New York State, and her primary role is as writer-at-large for Wine Enthusiast, where her beat is Australia, New Zealand, the UK and New...

Steve Flamsteed grew up in a full and lively household and succumbed to the pleasure of feeding people at a young age. Infected by punk energy from a young age, this lifelong devotee of good music has never lost the instinct of providing for—and feeding off—others. At the same time, a man whose curiosity led to a career-seeking quandary because cheffing, cheesemaking and wine all called with equal...

A podcast that muses on the greater good of wine was never going to miss a chance to speak to one of the world’s most-renowned living thinkers. Anthony Grayling is a prolific author, as well as Master of the New College of the Humanities and a Supernumerary Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford. I caught up with him at the tail-end of his three-week stint as philosopher-in-residence at Margaret Rive...

When you’re blessed to know a good teacher, you kind of think other people deserve the benefit of their wisdom. Meg Brodtmann MW was one of the first people to formally “teach” me wine as a lead lecturer in levels 3 and 4 of the Wine & Spirit Education Trust (WSET). She was straight-shooting, down-to-earth and amusing; her lack of hauteur belies a fierce intelligence, and tasting wine with her con...

PJ Charteris has ping-ponged between New Zealand and Australia his whole life, and few winemakers wear their wanderings on their sleeve quite like him. PJ and his wife, Chrissi Pattison, run the Charteris wine label from their cellar door in Pokolbin in the Hunter Valley in New South Wales, where they also peddle the New Zealand wines PJ makes in Central Otago. Kiwi PJ met his Australian bride whi...

Jeff Porter’s jovial face now beams at roomfuls of amateurs and professionals who’ve flocked to hear his pronouncements on Italian wine. How times have changed since he was a filthy, reeking dishwasher no one wanted to go near. A man with a seriously healthy sense of humour, a love of hospitality and a bent for the theatrical, Jeff has played just about every role going right across the wine scene...

Emma Rice was devastated to be told early on in life that she had looks and personality—not intelligence—going for her, and should therefore aim to be a secretary to a wine merchant. A life-changing double magnum of 1979 Krug Champagne had been the catalyst to her seeking advice on how to break into wine, only to have her boss throw this sexist advice back in her face. She immediately quit and sta...

The autonomous community of Galicia in northwest Spain is the Iberian Peninsula's coolest corner—but it's so hot right now. This is where the rain in Spain mainly falls, with lush green hills, mountains and meandering canyons sprawling inland from the craggy Atlantic coast. The city of Santiago de Compostela has drawn pious pilgrims for centuries, but Galicia has endured times of famine and hardsh...