Hard work never tasted so good.

The thing you quickly learn about low-intervention wine is that it takes a heck of a lot of effort to make.

In spending time in Longwarry with Bandicoot Run winemakers Adriana D’Amico and Al Johnson, the duality of this approach to winemaking becomes increasingly apparent. As does their passion for it.

Walking out among their vines – a mix of pinot noir, chardonnay, syrah, viognier and tempranillo, with some planted in 2005 and others in 2017 – they appear at total ease on this patch of earth.

Excitingly, the grapes are very nearly ready for harvest. Possibly in the coming week.

This means that Adriana and Al have to create a rich and diverse environment to encompass vines... Everything to get the key foundational building block of a great wine, the soil, as healthy as possible.

Adriana and Al met while studying architecture at the University of Melbourne in the early 2010s. At school, they were motivated by the potential and promise of subjects aligned with regenerative and green design principles. But upon graduation, the reality of the industry fell short. After witnessing examples of greenwashing, as well as the demands placed on graduate architects, the pair began to explore alternative pursuits.

The approach the couple undertook in plotting their next steps is another example of their considered and purposeful approach. Al shares that he read further about the world’s five ‘blue zones’: the areas where people live the longest and are the healthiest. Common threads between these regions included a diet high in local produce (ideally their own veggie patch), time in nature and incidental exercise.

With Italian heritage, Adriana had grown up with family gardens abundant with delicious produce. Meanwhile, Al’s family weekend escape was the 50-acre property in Longwarry (seven acres of grapes), where they’d planted fruit trees and syrah vines. After purchasing the bare, ecologically barren property in the early 90s, they also got busy with indigenous tree plantings and shelter belts.

When Al outlines the borders of the farm today, you see green-tinged grass up to the treeline and brown, sunburnt grass stubble beyond it.

You can hear the cacophony of life among the vines, from dragonflies to birds (including the farm ducks and chickens) and the ever-present company of San, the dog.

The threatened southern brown bandicoots living in the reserve adjacent to the farm are much more enigmatic.

This is kind of similar to the minimal intervention or lo-fi approach to winemaking as explored by Bandicoot Run.

A brief explanation from VinePair: Freshly harvested grapes contain pretty much all that is needed to make wine…[As] wine is a product of fermentation, the process by which yeasts turn sugar into alcohol in order to yield energy. Afterward, there’s a second bacterial fermentation, called malolactic fermentation, in most wines. This adjusts their acidity and makes them more stable.

During the middle of the last century, we began to industrialise yeast production for greater stability and consistency. This is great for baking identical loaves of bread for supermarkets, but maybe doesn’t make for as dynamic or interesting wines.

If you’re freeing yourself from commercial yeasts then, ideally, the vineyard’s naturally occurring yeasts and grapes need to be as healthy as possible. This means that Adriana and Al have to create a rich and diverse environment to encompass vines: making and spreading worm teas, hearty kelp brews and continued mulching. Everything to get the key foundational building block of a great wine, the soil, as healthy as possible. The work is constant.

They aim to undertake all this physical toil (comparatively, there’s very little machinery at Bandicoot Run) in sync with the natural ebb and flow of the seasons. Adriana has been keeping comprehensive diaries of the conditions at the farm. Details on rainfall, temperature and pruning times, but also when particular flowers bloom or animals appear.

The application of information, craft and art is a necessity in creating amazing architecture, and Adriana and Al are merging that approach with an admiration for natural systems and bottling it.

You may wonder why this Gippslandia Wine Department doesn’t include a tasting review or wax lyrical on the flavour of the Bandicoot Run wines. We’ve highlighted the the immense effort Adriana and Al put in all year, from enhancing the soil microbiome upwards, to their commitment to using the yeasts naturally found on their farm – all to get the very best out of the grapes and try and fully realise the site’s terroir in each vintage. So, you already know whether this vino is one to look out for…

Simply, you won't be disappointed.

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Adriana and Al would like to thank Dane from Nikau Farm Wines, Lucy and Alysha from Allevare, and James and Jess from A.R.C Wines for all their assistance, wisdom and support.

To find yourself a bottle of Bandicoot Run wines, mosey on to bandicootrun.com.au.

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Gippslandia - Issue No. 26

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