Micah Hewitt Defialy

Top Winemakers

Many winemakers dream of one day running their own wine estate, but few have managed to make the leap from purchaser of fruit to vigneron in such a short period of time as Micah Hewitt. His label Defialy made its debut in 2020 – and two short years later it was followed by Domaine Defialy, a home for the wines made from his own Macedon Ranges estate, Candlebark Hill. Here he crafts estate wines from pinot noir, chardonnay, syrah, cabernet sauvignon, merlot, cabernet franc and malbec under the Domaine Defialy name, alongside more esoteric offerings from varieties such as carménère and zibbibo for the Defialy label. Making his wines with the least possible amount of intervention in the cellar – “minimal fuckery,” as he puts it – and effortlessly threading the needle between natural cool and conventional polish, Hewitt has set Defialy and Domaine Defialy on a meteoric trajectory. Strap yourselves in.

There’s a restless, indefatigable energy behind Micah Hewitt and his Defialy project. “I have an endless fascination with wine and grape growing,” he says. “In my previous career [as a butcher], I felt that I had learnt everything I could – and I genuinely enjoyed it up until I realised that. Winemaking and grape-growing is endless – you’ll never learn everything, and if you think you have you shouldn’t be making wine.”

Hewitt started his Defialy label in 2020 – the name a tribute to his parents, an acronym of the phrase ‘don’t ever forget I’ll always love you’. The approach for the Defialy wines remains the same now as it did then – “an assortment of methods, both experimental and traditonal, to create something lively, emotive, and thought-provoking,” he summarises – and to this end he sources a wide range of varieties from a number of different Victorian regions, then happily plays with them, tearing up the rule book if he feels the need to.

Hewitt says he’s “always striving to be doing something a bit different from anyone else.” He adds: “Not for the sake of it – but the mainstream bores me.” Take his ‘Old Dog, New Tricks’ cuvée, which, for the 2022 vintage, requires almost a full paragraph of explication. Hewitt starts with 66% carménère from Heathcote, left on skins for 24 hours to form a rosé base wine. After this has fermented, he blends in 8% King Valley savagnin, then sends this portion of the wine to age in old oak for eight months. Meanwhile, a 13% portion of Macedon Ranges syrah is pressed off the skins and fermented as a white wine, while an equal portion of Macedon Ranges zibibbo is fermented on skins to make an orange wine. These two wines see the same amount of time in neutral oak as the carménère and savagnin blend, then all the components are blended together and left to get to know each other in stainless steel for a month before bottling. Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Heathcote anymore …

“In the short amount of years I’ve been making wine I’ve never set any restrictions on what I should be doing,” Hewitt admits. “I’m always experimenting and pushing the boundaries. If there’s one thing I’ve learnt is that it’s not to be dogmatic about your approach – seasons change [and] you change, and if you don’t accept this you’re gonna be very stressed.” This restless experimentation has found a market, with the volume of fruit turned into Defialy wine growing from three tonnes in its first vintage to over fifty tonnes currently, and exports flowing out beyond Australia’s borders.

“I’m always striving to be doing something a bit different from anyone else. Not for the sake of it – but the mainstream bores me.”

While Hewitt remains freewheeling in the cellar, he doesn’t compromise on fruit quality – and the search for high-quality organic fruit was the genesis of Domaine Defialy. Hewitt is characteristically blunt on this subject: “Victoria sucks for access to organic fruit – hence why I farm my own,” he says. “To get access to any fruit here you pretty much need to be growing your own, or have a lot of money to be able to afford the fruit – if you can actually source any! The only time you’re able to take over a vineyard is if it’s been neglected. Since taking over Candlebark Hill I have converted it to be organically grown and the result has been amazing, so much new life and energy in the vineyard.”

While he’s proud of the wines he makes with purchased fruit, it’s clear that the Domaine Defialy wines have a special place in Hewitt’s heart. “These wines are a special passion for me because they represent the incredibly hard work it takes to grow the fruit, then make the wines with the vineyard doing the talking,” he says. “They have no set release date each year; they are shared when I feel they are ready.” For all of the innovation in the winery, he’s focusing now on viticulture. “It’s a cliché, but wines are definitely made in the vineyard – and for me I just need to farm the very best I can to produce happy fruit, then make the right decision come time for picking,” he says. “It’s my third harvest here now and each has been very tricky!”

A big part of the love he feels for the estate vineyard comes from his general love of the region: “I love the Macedon Ranges, it’s such a beautiful and perfect wine country,” he says. “It’s a very small community and mostly the wines are made pretty safe but the quality of the fruit you can get from this region is sensational.” He adds, “I’m blessed to be farming and making wine here – it’s very special.”

And for the future? “This year I’m trying to make a conscious effort to scale down and really focus on the wines people love the most, but, more importantly, the wines I enjoy to make and drink,” he says. “I’m always humbled that people enjoy my wine; that’s my biggest success. Anything else is a gift.” Not that scaling down will mean any less skin in the game for Hewitt: “There’s no other way to do it – either you’re fully in or you’re not,” he muses. “Your wines will tell the story of how much you’ve invested in it.”

Micah Hewitt Defialy

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