Hadyn Black and Darcy ‘Ginger’ Naunton are Black & Ginger, a Grampians-based producer working out of local vineyards, including the fabled Malakoff Vineyard in the nearby Pyrenees. Black makes the wines and Naunton looks after the numbers. The label has focused on shiraz, the regional specialty, typically employing plenty of whole bunch and neutral oak, but in 2019 they added an orange muscat and riesling blend to the roster, as well as a nouveau-style grenache and a graciano.
Black and Naunton met at high school in 2002, and though their paths have been very different, they have long shared a love of the outdoors, and of wine. While Naunton worked in technology and finance in Melbourne, Black was working in vineyards across Victoria. However, the pair always made time for 4WDriving and camping trips, and on one of these, a beer or wine too many around the campfire led to the genesis of Black & Ginger.
“I want to make interesting wines from interesting varieties. We started with shiraz …but every winery in the country sells shiraz so now we’ll concentrate on some different things. The nouveau style grenache has been a massive hit and the orange muscat is something interesting… The grower we source these grapes from has some Portuguese varieties too, so we’ll be having a crack at those as well.”
Starting his academic career with a Bachelor of Engineering in Metallurgy at Curtin University, in Perth, Black later studied a Bachelor of Winemaking and Viticulture at NMIT, in Melbourne. He’s still working on finishing them, well the latter one at least.
Black has worked with some of Victoria’s most highly regarded winemakers, starting with Steve Flamsteed at Giant Steps in 2010, then for two years alongside Ben Ranken at Galli Estate (Wilimee and Mount Monument), before he took a cellar hand gig at Best’s for the 2013 vintage, working with Justin Purser. Black managed to also complete the 2012 and 2013 vintages at Rombauer Vineyards, in the Napa Valley.
That temporary job at Best’s evolved into something more lasting. Black has been making wine under the Black & Ginger label since 2015, and bought a small vineyard, Hounds Run, with his fiancé in 2016. With both ventures needing his full attention, he left Best’s in 2018. That home vineyard is slowly being converted to cane pruning, while the focus has switched to organic farming, with certification the end goal.
With a philosophy of keeping things simple, Black uses traditional winemaking techniques and not letting heavy hands or oak get in the way. “I’m not going to change the winemaking world. As every winemaker will say, great wines are made in the vineyard. I want to make interesting wines from interesting varieties. We started with shiraz …but every winery in the country sells shiraz so now we’ll concentrate on some different things. The nouveau style grenache has been a massive hit and the orange muscat is something interesting… The grower we source these grapes from has some Portuguese varieties too, so we’ll be having a crack at those as well,” he says.
The first of those experiments with Iberian varieties saw a hatful of graciano bottled in 2019, which was made to the same philosophy for all of the Black & Ginger wines. “My wines are made in a style that is easy to drink without being boring,” says Black. “Not too heavy, not too light. I feel they can work both ways; you can match them at a flash dinner party or restaurant, or just drink a bottle with your mates on a Sunday arvo. My only rule is not to stuff around with additions and winemakers’ tricks. I’m is not exactly minimal intervention or natural, but I keep it simple.”
Edenflo is the culmination of Andrew Wardlaw’s extensive experience here and overseas, a label centered around celebrating the Eden Valley with wines that continue his fascination with native yeasts and minimal intervention that he’s been championing for two decades. His process has always been lo-fi, with basket pressing, no chilling or fining, and gravity employed over pumps, and he never does numbers in the lab. He was a pioneer, if you will, and his wines are very much still at the cutting edge, with unlikely assemblies of grapes, some skinsy, some not, as well as elegantly pitched takes on Eden Valley reds.
Sam Dunlevy’s Berg Herring is a McLaren Vale label focused on the future, with a deep investigation into heat-tolerant Mediterranean varieties that are thriving in the warming climate, and a style built around earlier picking and minimal intervention to fashion fruit-forward wines that are pitched for wine drinkers – Dunlevy included – who are increasingly embracing bright styles made for earlier consumption.
Jack and Tash Weedon’s Rollick label is built around the bright, drink-now styles of wine they love to drink themselves. Working with grenache, shiraz, cabernet franc and viognier from the Barossa, riesling from the Eden Valley and fiano from both the Clare Valley and the Riverland, the fruit is picked earlier to retain freshness, while less time in oak or tank has much the same impact. The Rollick wines are instantly recognisable wines of variety and place, but with the vibrancy and freshness dials wound to maximum.
Subscribe to our newsletter
Young Gun of Wine is your shortcut to cutting edge wines, the places to go, and the people behind it all.
Subscribe to be amongst the first to know of our latest discoveries in wine.
We'll bring you the inside running from the growers, the makers, the wholesalers, the retailers and the sommeliers, too.
