The Making of Wine
Every wine begins with nature. What happens next is a series of choices.
Forces Create Conditions. Choices Create Outcomes.
Climate. Soil. Rain. Sunlight. Wind. These are the Forces, and the winemaker cannot change them.
What they can change are the Choices. Every decision, from the day the grapes are picked to the vessel they ferment in, shapes the final wine in your glass.
Given by nature. Climate, rainfall, soil, altitude, slope, aspect, geology, and the character of the vintage itself.
Made by people. Harvest timing, vessel, skin contact, fermentation, ageing, and blending decisions that shape the outcome.
The Journey
Explore each choice to understand how wine is made — from grape to glass.
Fermentation Vessels
The vessel a wine ferments or matures in is one of the most defining choices a winemaker makes.
Steel contributes almost no flavour of its own, allowing the fruit to remain the hero of the wine.
Oak slowly introduces oxygen while adding flavour and texture as the wine matures inside it.
Concrete breathes slightly like oak but contributes no wood flavour, preserving freshness while adding texture.
One of humanity's oldest winemaking vessels. Clay allows tiny amounts of oxygen without adding oak flavours.
Skin Contact
How long grape juice rests with its skins determines colour, tannin, and depth of flavour.
Usually only a few hours of skin contact, or none at all, producing fresh, delicate wines.
Days or weeks of skin contact, resulting in deep colour, tannin, and texture.
Skin contact continues throughout fermentation, creating the colour and structure of red wine.
A second, natural fermentation converts sharp malic acid ,think green apple, into softer lactic acid, think milk or cream. The result is a creamier, rounder wine with less sharp acidity.
The wine is left resting on its spent yeast, gaining creaminess, notes of bread and biscuit, greater texture, and more complexity.
Blending
Combining different vineyards, varieties, barrels, or harvest dates is one of the winemaker's most important choices.
One parcel may bring fruit. Another, structure. Another, freshness. Blending brings them together in balance.
The vineyard gives the possibilities.
The winemaker makes the choices.
The wine tells the story of both.
Five Chapters of Wine Knowledge
Nature gives the conditions. People make the choices. Together, they tell the story.
Climate, rainfall, soils, altitude, slope, aspect, geology, vintage.
Grapes, viticulture, pruning, canopy management, irrigation, harvesting.
Skin contact, vessels, yeast, malolactic fermentation, lees, blending, maturation.
Style, body, acidity, tannin, alcohol, sweetness, aroma, ageing potential.
Food pairing, serving temperature, glassware, occasions, cellaring.