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Winemaker of the year 2008 finalist: Louisa Rose

A lot has happened in Louisa Rose’s career since she was a second-time finalist in this award in 2005. She was promoted to chief winemaker of Yalumba in 2006, taking over responsibility for all winemaking. This year, Yalumba released an innovative new riesling, called Prima. It’s a light-bodied, early-harvested wine from the Pewsey Vale vineyard, bottled with low alcohol and some residual sweetness, making it a fine aperitif style. The first vintage, 2007, was a tentative 700 dozen and sold out quickly after a rave reception.

Rose has played a role in two important charters that Yalumba has released in the past year: the Old Vine Charter and the Reserve Charter. These are, like most decisions at Yalumba, the result of group endeavour and are great examples of leadership typical of this family-owned company. “We are a team, we’re in each other’s pockets all the time,” Rose says. “There’s never a decision that’s made that is unilateral.”

As we were going to press, the Yalumba’s 2007 The Virgilius was announced the international viognier trophy winner at the 2008 International Wine Challenge. Their success with viognier is unique in Australia and remarkable: only a family winery could take the risk of investing in an obscure grape variety and make it a success. Now Yalumba fields five viogniers – Y Series, Eden Valley, Heggies and The Virgilius – and an occasional botrytis version. It’s also one of the biggest players in the shiraz viognier blending field. And this year they made a second batch of V de Vie, a clear varietal spirit in the style of grappa or eau de vie. Viognier again, of course.

Before taking over from Brian Walsh as chief winemaker, Rose was in charge of white wines and, apart from the Pewsey Vale phenomenon, she’s had a big effect. At Pewsey she removed the last of the red vines and planted more whites, extending the range to pinot gris and gewürztraminer as well as Prima and Contours. The Heggies rieslings have been consistently good and a Reserve is now released at five to six years of age, but only in the best years. The chardonnays have also been further refined, and the superb, well-priced FDW7C has been created from Adelaide Hills fruit.

What of the future? “Yalumba has always been experimenting with new varieties and this is where viognier came from,” says Rose. “Some of these varieties may make nice wine, but they don’t have a place in our portfolio.” Two that really excite Rose are roussanne and albariño. There’s also a lot of clonal work on shiraz. “We took cuttings from 16 Octavius-level old-vine vineyards and propagated them up, planting them in the same vineyard not knowing if there would be any differences,” says Rose. “Now we’re making small batches, it’s obvious they’re very different. Stylistic refinements are likely to come out of this work.”

Yalumba recently released several single-site wines and they’re thinking about site, variety and clone, and what makes some wines unique. “It got us thinking about what makes a great single-site wine versus a blend,” says Rose.

Will we see another charter? “If there is one, it could be on environmental sustainability,” says Rose. “We may decide to define our philosophy on this. It wouldn’t just be about viticulture and winemaking but also packaging, shipping and other issues.”

Rose has only ever had one career and worked for one company. But Yalumba has a very low staff turnover: employees are looked after and the culture is one in which people  blossom. Rose, who grew up in a vineyard in the Yarra Valley (which her parents still have), has flourished at Yalumba and we look forward to her future exploits.

TEXT HUON HOOKE PHOTOGRAPHY YALUMBA WINES

This article appeared in the August/September 2008 issue of Gourmet Traveller WINE.