Eventful times here at CellarHand, with a masterful mentor and his prodigious protégé coming out with high-profile releases. The former is Stephen Pannell, the McLaren Vale maestro who’s tapping into his obsession with Italian varieties this month with the release of his eighth Nebbiolo from the Adelaide Hills, with vintage 2016 producing perhaps the finest Aussie edition of this grape to date. This is joined by the 2017 S.C. Pannell Barbera and the ’18 Nero Diavola, a cheeky spin on the hot-topic native name for…

When Jancis Robinson asked CellarHand to be the Australian importer of her new glassware range, we didn’t hesitate. Why would we? Here was the world’s most eloquent and authoritative wine lover - owner of arguably its most astute and experienced palate - offering something beautiful that elevates the art of sharing wine to its rightful place: Somewhere close to perfection. The Jancis Robinson Collection is in fact a cross-disciplinary collaboration with celebrated London-based product designer Richard Brendon, who pairs a love of heritage crafts with…

“It’s the realisation of a dream seeded by Rob’s grandfather, Jack Mann,” says Genevieve Mann, one half of Corymbia’s dynamic duo. “A departure from the orthodox, to achieve a unique expression of Margaret River Cabernet. Variety, place and experience are woven together to redefine what’s possible.” When she talks about experience, she means it. Her husband Rob achieved god-like status in the sphere of Margaret River Cabernet during his near 10-year reign as chief at Cape Mentelle, from where he was plucked to breathe fresh…

Nebbiolo may be very “now” in Australia but this variety Stephen Pannell calls “vinous heroin” has been in his - err, veins - for years. He’s worked vintages with his great friends at G.D. Vajra, and is now releasing his eighth Nebbiolo under the S.C. Pannell label. The style he goes for takes a solid cue from traditional Barolo, with extended maceration on skins before the decision to press is taken purely on taste. This gives a very different tannin profile, winding them to the…

It's a short and sweet edition this time around, built on a suite of new releases. In the red corner, we have the old-vine quartet by Ben Glaetzer from 2017 in the Barossa. Another cooler season there has delivered that combination of freshness and relative elegance with depth and concentration. From further afield in Frankland River, the Smith Cullam clan has taken it up another level, truly, with the 2018 single-vineyard Rieslings from Poison Hill and Isolation Ridge, plus the '16 Shiraz from Isolation Ridge.…

We made no secret of our rapture at gaining a chance to work with the Vaira family as importer of G.D. Vajra and Luigi Baudana into Australia. Since our first shipment a year ago, both Giuseppe Vaira and winemaker Eugene Qiao have made it over to these shores, revelling in the warmth of the welcome they received from the Australian trade and wine lovers more broadly. This is a family that communicates its joy and pride in Piedmont – the wines and culture of this…

By Ed Merrison It’s like synaesthesia. Whenever I hear the Vajra name or taste the wines, I see a riot of colour. It’s like drinking in the cheerful hues of the labels and stained-glass windows, or splashing through the poetry-soaked palette of the Barolo landscape. Giuseppe Vaira reckons he wasn’t brainwashed. I don’t think I was either. It’s just that every interaction with the wines, the place and the people has felt like tracing another vivid detail on the same seamless canvas. Fluidity and fusion…

Seems like only yesterday this was little more than a curio as far as some were concerned. “Flag-bearing family masters the Bordeaux and Burgundy varieties and turns its attention to Rhône as a flight of fancy” – something like that. “Grenache in the Yarra? Let me know how that works out!” But those in the know knew from the outset the Middletons don’t do things on a whim. The long-term vision was imbued with the same fixity of purpose as anything else here, and the…

The trajectory of the not-so-new generation at Frankland Estate is as sure, true and thrilling as the finish on the Isolation Ridge Riesling. “An issue facing family wineries in Australia, now and always, is the question of generational change,” wrote Peter Forrestal for Gourmet Traveller WINE last year in extolling Judi Cullam, newly-crowned recipient of the Len Evans Award for Leadership. “Judi and Barrie Smith have tackled handing over to their children, Hunter and Elizabeth (and her winemaking husband, Brian Kent) in an exemplary manner,”…

It’s three years now since Nick Farr unveiled Irrewarra to the world. A new canvas and a different palette to work with out there in the Western District, somewhere between Geelong and Henty but distinct from both. The damp-earth aspect to the wines, the unique fruit spectrum and the super-cool acid profile were enticing ingredients to this master of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. And Irrewarra has delivered. The project named for an Aboriginal term meaning “long spear throw” has hit the mark every time. The…

Ben Glaetzer’s follow-up foursome to the outstanding 2016s are the fruit of another cooler vintage in the Barossa. There was a good dose of rain through the winter and freshening rains fell intermittently through the ripening season, where a cooler-than-average spring was followed by a later-than-normal harvest. It’s a recipe for another round of brilliant Barossa reds, with lift, layers and freshness marrying the succulent fruit in that typical Glaetzer way. “The 2017 wines are of excellent quality exhibiting purity and lift with firm tannins…

“The wines from Martha and Daniel Gantenbein are a safe investment, and no matter if they're Pinot Noir or Chardonnay, they are still among the finest and most vibrant wines produced in modern Switzerland,” writes Stephan Reinhardt of Wine Advocate of this estate in the Graubünden (Grisons) district of the upper Rhine valley in eastern Switzerland. It’s one of the most breathtakingly beautiful places on Earth, but why are you reading about it here? Well, Erni Loosen made the introduction, reasoning that the most famous…

Joe and Lou Holyman, together with CellarHand, are delighted to announce that CellarHand has taken up the mantle as exclusive distributor of the Stoney Rise and Holyman throughout Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania. Several members of the CellarHand team have long been friends with the Holymans, and all of us have sought out and enjoyed their exceptional wines. This mutual admiration culminated in Stoney Rise’s entry into our Tassie portfolio in 2018. A natural – and bloody exciting – progression has been the…

CellarHand's 20th Anniversary celebrations - don't get us wrong, it's a year-long thing - have meant a brief hiatus for the CellarHand newsletter, but here it is, back with a vengeance. The domestic releases are headed this month by the super '16s from Sandra de Pury of Yeringberg, and by the 2017 single-vineyard releases from Leongatha and Red Hill from on-song Onannon. A new name arrives in the portfolio, too, with Stoney Rise now joining CellarHand in several states. A few new wines elsewhere, with Mount Mary…

For 155 years the de Pury family has lived and farmed at Yeringberg, and for all but 50 of those years, the family has grown grapes and made wine. Frederick-Guillaume de Pury bought the land in 1863. He’d been working in the Yarra Valley since his arrival from Switzerland in 1850. He developed a large vineyard (about 25ha) and made excellent wines, first in a simple bark-roofed winery and then in a new weatherboard building. The winery and underground cellars are still used today. George…