L’Anima, literally, ‘the soul’ or animating principle. The thing that makes you tick. In this case, wine in all its diversity and how it represents an intersection of history, geography, food, culture and that idea of ‘place’.
Climate appropriate varieties. Judicious use of blending in a nod to the old world and to the idea that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Wine made naturally but with care - science in service to art while acknowledging beauty in imperfection. Wine as food, something primarily consumed at a table. The importance of context - that phenomena of ‘holiday wines’ and that the pleasure of the wine is inextricably linked to both the setting and the company in which it is consumed.
Having worked in the Adelaide Hills, Tuscany, McLaren Vale and Tasmania for some notable producers, it was time to start this intentionally small project as a creative outlet for myself and a means to combine what I’ve learnt to date with my own ideas about wine. The aim being to make distinctive, interesting wine with a specific aesthetic from varieties usually undersold as ‘alternative’. These varieties are ideally suited to this region, tolerating the heat while requiring less water and fewer inputs in the winery. As we become more focussed on growing the right grape in the right place, these climate appropriate varieties will become increasingly important over time and will perhaps be given a chance to shine as more than simply ‘alternative’.
“Placeless events are inconceivable, in that everything that happens must happen somewhere, and so history issues from geography in the same way that water issues from a spring: unpredictably but site-specifically.
We tend to think of landscapes as affecting us most strongly when we are in them, when they offer us the primary sensations of touch and sight. But there are also the landscapes we bear with us in absentia, those places that live on in memory long after they have withdrawn in actuality, and such places - retreated to most often when we are most remote from them - are among the most important landscapes we possess.”
― Robert Macfarlane, The Old Ways: A Journey on Foot
A note about our winemaking
All of our wines are made with only grapes and sulphur and allowed to stabilise naturally over time in the cellar. No fining, animal or otherwise, is used. With the exception of Sobremesa with its residual sugar (which is sterile filtered to reduce the risk of refermentation in bottle), they are unfiltered. Under certain conditions, it’s possible for a slight haze (protein) or deposit (tartrate crystals) to form.
These are harmless cosmetic issues only. There are methods and products that can be used to eliminate these, however they compromise both flavour and aroma and are not without environmental consequence. So on balance, we’ve decided not to use them. If you have concerns about your bottle, please contact us.
We have done away with a capsule on top of the cork in an effort to reduce unnecessary packaging. Together with the use of relatively lightweight glass and recycled cardboard, these are simple steps we are taking to reduce the environmental footprint of our wine. The agglomerated cork we are using contains no plastic microspheres or glue and is carbon negative (-395g per cork), helping to partially offset the carbon footprint of our glass bottles.
There seems to be some deliberate misinformation around from brands selling ‘zero sugar wine’. To clarify, the sugar (approx. 180g/L - 250g/L) in grape juice is from naturally occurring grape sugars. Once fermented (when yeast convert the sugars to alcohol and turn the juice into wine), our wines, like most dry wines, contain less than 1g/L of residual sugar and measure around 0.1g per serve or 65-80 kcal per 100ml. Our dessert wine is the exception, which contains natural residual sugar inherent to the style.