PRECEDE: Nestled on land once owned by the Nobelius family, Canadian expatriate John Wall’s winery has made a lasting contribution to the Dandenong’s status for prestigious wines. Speaking with Gazette journalist Corey Everitt, John tells of the rewards and challenges of the tireless work at his Emersleigh Estate.
BREAkOUT QUOTE: “All I remember in my early 20s, I lived in Queensland and going to Stanthorpe through all the wineries, I was thinking this is what I want to do.“
Vines were first planted in 1996 at Emersleigh Estate. Named for being between Emerald and Avonsleigh, it was originally focused on producing sparkling wines.
Sparkling is best produced in cooler climates where the varieties of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir thrive the best. The Dandenongs Ranges are best known for these and Emersleigh has its unique spot for the cooler weather.
“You look at the Yarra Valley, we have this singular attribute that is cooler than the rest of the valley,“ John said.
“We pick all of our grapes at least two weeks behind the rest of the valley
“When you get that for sparkling wine, it makes a much more flavoursome wine.”
The estate makes four sparklings, a Brut, Blanc de Blanc, a Rose and their premium Sans Annee blended from several vintages.
However, Emersleigh couldn’t get by with just sparkling. In part from the economic realities of running the business and also because John seemingly can’t resist making an already tough job all the more harder.
Most of the estate’s existence has been run as a part-time business. A side project for something John had always been passionate about.
Born in Canada, he moved to Queensland with his family when he was a teenager. His career would take him elsewhere, but he always had an underlying passion for the sacred beverage.
“All I remember in my early 20s, I lived in Queensland and going to Stanthorpe through all the wineries, I was thinking this is what I want to do,“ John said.
He wouldn’t get the moment to truly indulge his dream until some years later. When they had their first vintage by 2001, the estate was just a vineyard.
The grapes would be transported to a winery in the Yarra Valley, however, this routine would come apart during the 2009 Black Saturday Bushfires – when the winery had to shut operation for the summer.
“We rang up the winery and said book us in, gave them the date and then the day before we were going to pick we got a phone call to say sorry we had put all our gear away and we are not going to process,“ John said.
Coming out of this situation, the estate made the move to become its own winery. After a few years to achieve council approval, Emerleigh Estate became a full winemaking operation where they serve their wines to residents on the weekend.
A significant increase in the work while John was still maintaining a regular job, but it seems his passion overrides the effort.
“It’s really hard work, my kids grew up basically here on the property, but they want nothing to do with the vines anymore,“ John said with a laugh.
“When you are trying to work and run a vineyard it’s not easy, so for the last 12 months I have been just working here.
“But I don’t mind the work, I find it therapeutic working in vines, it’s calming, it’s relaxing, a great time for thinking.”
Among the sparkling, Emersleigh produces a variety of Shiraz, Tempranillo, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Rose and an assortment of blends between. All these are under the range called ’Off the Wall’, while Emersleigh Estate encompasses the sparkling.
No year is the same for wine, the season is the biggest deciding factor that can make one year of the same variety have a completely different profile to the previous. The production of wine is never really the same either, presenting its own challenges that can influence the wine.
Emersleigh Estate is no doubt innovative, not only influenced by John but his friends in the industry like the widely-revered Rob Hall.
In 2019, the estate had one of the biggest harvests ever. Producing about two and half thousand litres of Pinot Noir, so much that they ran out of barrels.
A solution was scrambled with the acquisition of a puncheon barrel, a much larger barrel than the traditional barrique.
Problem solved, yet even this produced divergence in the wine.
“It just provided a really different flavour profile and I played around with it to try and work out how we could blend it,“ John said.
“In the end I just couldn’t blend the two of them because the combined was not as good as the two separate.
“The puncheon barrel adds a lot of quality to the wine, it actually gives it a greater depth and it’s turned out to be a really well accepted wine.”
So the ’Puncheon Pinot Noir’ was created, it’s this ongoing dynamic through each unique year that can give the job so much reward.
Sometimes, the years can be unique in their misfortune. In the last few years, the seasons have rendered poor harvests for Shiraz and Tempranillo in particular.
“Farmers tend to be optimists, we keep looking forward and seeing what we need to get done to make sure that if it does come through that we are prepared for it,“ John said.
“But again we got hit with rains at the wrong time of the year and it just makes it complicated.
“May and June were probably the driest months we have had for four or five years.
“But we are hoping this summer will be a little different.”
Despite this, there is still plenty of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay to go around, and some of the poor-yielding varieties have been made up for with grapes shipped from other vineyards. John is unperturbed as there is not much you can do against the weather, to him “it’s always an interesting time.”
Most importantly, Emersleigh Estate is still open every Sunday and Public Holidays where you can taste their wines from 11am to 5pm. Some developments at the winery and upcoming events are in the works as well.
If you are interested in Emersleigh Estate, you can get in contact through emersleigh@gmail.com
