Halliday Wine Companion Top 100 Wineries 2024: 26–50

Best wineries Australia

In the list of wineries ranked 26–50, you'll find 13 wine regions represented across five states. 12 of those wineries are from Victoria, and six of them are some of the top wineries in the Yarra Valley. Looking for the best wineries in Yarra Valley for lunch? Seville Estate, Medhurst and Coldstream Hills are all options. Also representing Victoria is Crawford River from Henty, Bannockburn Vineyards in Geelong, icon producer Sorrenberg in Beechworth, Syrahmi in Heathcote, Place of Changing Winds in the Macedon Ranges and, for those partial to a Grampians shiraz, there's Mount Langi Ghiran.

In South Australia, Rieslingfreak is a Clare Valley champion. When it comes to the Barossa Valley, Sami-Odi and Alkina Wine Estate are both 5-star wineries. Stella Bella and Leeuwin Estate are Margaret River wineries on the list, and Brokenwood and Lake's Folly are two wineries often featured on Hunter Valley wine tours.

View the Top 100 Wineries: 1–25

View the Top 100 Wineries: 51–75

View the Top 100 Wineries: 76–100

Rieslingfreak | Sami-Odi | Stella Bella Wines | Thistledown Wines | Leeuwin Estate | Lake's Folly | Seville Estate | Crawford River Wines | Bannockburn Vineyards | Alkina Wine Estate | Sorrenberg | Brokenwood | Gembrook Hill | Syrahmi | Place of Changing Winds | Medhurst | Hoddles Creek Estate | Battles Wine | Serrat | Elderton | Ashton Hills Vineyard | Coldstream Hills | Chatto | Clonakilla | Mount Langi Ghiran

26. Rieslingfreak

John and Belinda Hughes like riesling. A lot. Their label has immortalised John’s nickname while at university, where his love for the grape bordered on the obsessive. That obsession has not dimmed, with the portfolio of wines burrowing into almost every corner of possibility for the grape. Rieslingfreak is based in the Barossa, with grapes sourced from John’s family property in the Clare Valley, amongst others, as well as sites in the Eden Valley. The spectacular success of the label is how well the wines reflect both where they are grown but also how adroitly, how effortlessly, they slip into different style skins, soaking up modest to considerable sugar residuals while maintaining keen balance, or skipping down a traditionally dry line without austerity. The 2023 No.12 Flaxman Valley Riesling topped the varietal category in the 2025 Companion. And the 2024 wines are dipped in gold, with all eight wines submitted receiving 95 points or more, three of them 96 and four 97 and over. It’s an incredible achievement.

5 ★ winery | Halliday profile | Rieslingfreak | @rieslingfreakofficial

27. Yeringberg

A visit to Yeringberg can make one think that this is one of Australia’s oldest producers, so well preserved are the historic buildings and winemaking artefacts of a bygone era. But those familiar will know that while this is true, with it founded in the 1860s, there was a significant gap in production as the Yarra slumped from its 19th century glory days to its revival later in the 20th century. That interregnum hardly seems to matter, especially given that Guill de Pury was schooled by his father, George, on the viticulture and winemaking practices prior to the cessation of production in 1921, and that he replanted the vineyard in 1969 on the same site planted by his grandfather. A gap, yes, but also a kind of continuity. The fifth-generation stewards, siblings Sandra and David de Pury, winemaker and vineyard manager respectively, are steeped in that history, while bringing their own sensibilities. Today, Yeringberg makes superbly individual expressions of the Yarra’s prime varieties, arguably peaking with their sublimely elegant cabernets. Simply titled Yeringberg, it is the beating heart of the estate, but Yeringberg is just as acclaimed for Rhône whites, especially the marsanne and roussanne blend, and the maturing shiraz vines suggest a significant future in the silty grey loam soils.

5 ★ winery | Yeringberg profile | Winery website | @yeringberg

28. S.C. Pannell

Stephen and Fiona Pannell have three distinct labels – this, Koomilya and Protero. The eponymous one logically the locus, perhaps. Though also not, as Steve would rather his name scrubbed from the livery. That’s hard to do, given his exalted position in the wine world, but it tells a tale. All have their own distinct stories, and all narrate location, and of grape varieties settled into uniquely suited sites. In other words, it is about evoking place, not maker. The S.C. Pannell label is a quality guarantee as assured as any, but it is the range of single-site grenaches that lifts the reputation into the stratosphere. The Smart, Old McDonald and home Little Branch 2023s are keenly differentiated by site, with winemaking deferential and quality uniformly stellar. However, it is the 2022 Sunrise 99 off 103-year-old vines on the Little Branch Vineyard that is rewriting the script again. It is a phenomenal wine, and in all future releases the Pannell grenache suite will all be from Little Branch, lovingly made from the ground up. For a maker so firmly in elite territory, it’s hard to imagine how much of an upward arc there can be, but just watch.

5 ★ winery | S.C. Pannell profile | Winery website | @scpannell

29. Bondar Wines

A superstar estate, but a down-to-earth one. Selina Kelly and Andre Bondar’s project kicked off in the 2013 vintage with tiny parcels of chardonnay and shiraz. The latter was picked in the last breath of a fading day, the violet sky gifting the name for a wine that is still emblematic of their credo. The Violet Hour is Bondar in microcosm. Always vibrant, fragrant, quietly detailed, with room to breathe and see the nuances, medium weighted, naturally structured, alive, of unimpeachable quality and – importantly – exceptional value. That Bondar won Best Value Winery in the 2026 Halliday Wine Companion is no surprise. That award is such a critical one. It’s not so much about price, but rather overdelivering, and they do that across the entire portfolio at all tariffs. Ten wines submitted. All gold. You could raise the prices, and by a bit, and they’d still stroll into the loftier reaches of the Top 100. If it’s Bondar, you know it’s excellent.

5 ★ winery | Bondar Wines profile | Winery website | @bondarwines

30. Alkina Wine Estate

Alkina is a project of considerable ambition, bristling with brio but absent hubris. Winemaker Amelia Nolan guides this extraordinary biodynamic venture in Greenock, making elegant, bell-clear wines of place, right down to microscopic detail, leaving no stone unturned. That hackneyed phrase is there for pun alone, given the 400-odd soil pits dug by Chilean terroir specialist Pedro Parra (he has a PhD on the subject) and vineyard manager Johnny Schuster, unearthing the geological nuances of that site, first planted back in the 1950s. The intense mapping has uncovered a complex matrix, with the vineyard divided into polygons of discrete geologies, with some blended and others solo (mainly grenache) as individual micro-terroir bottlings. Amelia’s winemaking, though never dictated by recipe, employs ample whole bunch, ultra-gentle extraction and vessels to magnify but never intrude on that expression of place. All this would be for nothing if the wines weren’t both excellent quality and lucid storytellers of what lies beneath. They are, of course, and emphatically so on both counts.

5 ★ winery | Alkina profile | Winery website | @alkinawine

31. Wynns Coonawarra Estate

Sue Hodder was inducted into the Hall of Fame in the 2025 Wine Companion, honouring her tenure at the historic Wynns, on the site of John Riddoch’s vineyard, the first established in Coonawarra. Revitalised and renamed by Samuel and David Wynn in the 1950s, she first arrived at the stone-gabled winery in 1993, working alongside Peter Douglas, then senior winemaker. In 1998, she took the top job, with Sarah Pidgeon filling her prior role. Nearly three decades later, the pair are still working together, having made some of Coonawarra’s finest wines and always still pushing the boundaries. Under their stewardship, distinguished single vineyard wines have been added, and the winemaking has been refined and nuanced to add more detail and layers to even the most accessible wines. Wynn’s Black Label Cabernet Sauvignon is the enduring symbol of this estate, always overdelivering on character and quality for the tariff, while having the pedigree to age for decades – it is one of Australian wine’s great bargains. At the top of the tree, the John Riddoch Cabernet Sauvignon has never been better, and the Michael Shiraz is the standard bearer for the grape in the region. Wynns is such a classic label, but it could also not be more dynamic.

5 ★ winery | Wynns Coonawarra Estate profile | Winery website | @wynnscoonawarra

32. Chatto

Jim Chatto’s story has been told often. He is one of our most feted winemakers, taking on big roles and lifting the prestige of wineries, including the great Mount Pleasant. But the lure of making no-compromise pinot noir in territory he thought ideally suited, in this case in a warm site in the southerly cool of the Huon Valley skirting Glaziers Bay, was too compelling. Today, Tasmania is his permanent home, with his wife Daisy and young family. The 2019 vintage was a tough one, with the home vineyard crop lost to smoke taint, but it led to a couple of positive developments. One was the diversification in the 2020 vintage, sourcing fruit from across the Apple Isle for single-site bottlings as well as a blended wine, giving the previously scarce Chatto portfolio some more accessible offerings, yet still bearing the same stamp of quality. The second was a family sojourn in Burgundy to escape the loss, which resulted in an ongoing relationship with Jane Eyre to make some Chatto wines there, and in return she makes some of hers at Chatto. It’s a win-win. The 2024 local releases are all excellent, but the pinnacle home bottlings are something else, with the Intrigue notching 97 points and the Isle 97+. 

5 ★ winery | Chatto profile | Winery website | @chatto_wines

33. Gembrook Hill

Nestled into a natural amphitheatre on vividly red volcanic soils on the southern edge of the region, Gembrook Hill is one of the oldest and coolest vineyards in the Upper Yarra. First planted in 1983 by Ian and June Marks, there’s something special about the place, both in the serene calm one feels when visiting, and in the reflection of it in glass. It’s not the oldest of the modern era of the Yarra, but it is one of the most consistently excellent and true to an enduring style that is unmistakably Gembrook. That’s not to say things haven’t evolved, but the gentle, uncluttered winemaking has always been a constant, tuned ever finer by son Andrew Marks. A Gembrook pinot noir is as recognisably Gembrook as it was 20 years ago – pale in the glass, fragrant, ethereal. It’s a familiar style from many makers today. But Gembrook have always done it, because they understood what the fruit needed from early on. Unbowed by trend, all the estate’s wines are timeless expressions, unwaveringly top flight and some of this country’s finest.

5 ★ winery | Gembrook Hill profile | Winery website | @gembrookhill

34. Wantirna Estate

Wantirna is credited as being the first planted in the rebirth of the Yarra Valley. That was in 1963, but they weren’t the first with a commercial vintage, instead using those early years to experiment with varieties on a small scale to find those most suited. It was a considered approach, and that ethos remains under the direction of Reg and Bertina Egan’s daughter Maryann. While many of the Yarra’s founding wineries have expanded their vineyards and operations, Wantirna Estate has remained charmingly compact, with only four or so hectares of vines, and most of the cabernet sauvignon and merlot the original 1963 plantings. The winery is also a thumb-sized affair – just enough. Four wines are released each year, with a production of only about 700 dozen in total. It’s a tiny yield, but it’s also one that means Maryann is intimately across even the smallest detail. And that’s how the wines feel – nurtured and never forced. The latest release sees another clean sweep of gold-medal scores, with the Amelia Cabernet Sauvignon Merlot cresting at 97+ points. That wine consistently sits – with a scant handful of others – as a benchmark for medium-weighted Yarra cabernets. And its siblings are no less revered.

5 ★ winery | Wantirna Estate profile | Winery website | @wantirna_estate

35. Aphelion Wine

Rob and Louise Mack’s shared epiphany may have been over a bottle of Barolo (on a cruise ship, no less), but it was grenache that became their pole star. Corporate refugees, the pair launched Aphelion in 2014 with a frugal parcel of grapes and even less money. A decade on, it is in the pantheon with a handful of other great grenache disruptors, a cohort who saw something most of us couldn’t, but forged on tirelessly to co-write one of wine’s great modern stories. The 2024 grenache wines from Aphelion are mesmerisingly good, world class wines of inimitable character – Aphelion’s poetic perihelion, if you will. Not only that, but chenin blanc from this address is also consistently topflight, so too the democratically affordable Welkin range. Aphelion has consistently produced excellence, but the recent releases see them stroll into the Top 100.

5 ★ winery | Aphelion Wine profile | Winery website | @aphelionwine

36. Crawford River Wines

The Thomson family planted riesling and cabernet sauvignon on their mixed farming property in Victoria’s cool south-west in 1975. The riesling, planted to a natural amphitheatre, went in due to the success at Seppelt’s Drumborg Vineyard. It was a good hint, with Crawford River now long established on the top rung of makers of the grape in this country. Belinda Thomson has taken the work of her father, John, and elvated the reputation through an enhanced vigneron’s approach, with the vineyard taking the lead. That process has embraced organic farming methods, starting in 2008, with systemic chemicals eschewed and a focus placed on soil biology through composting, mulching and organic teas and sprays to balance soil nutrition and increase vine and fruit resilience. That work shows up as better acid retention in the reds and a clearer mineral reflection in the whites, she says. It’s hard to argue with, as the wines have never been better. The cabernet is an evolving story, with fascinating results from long skin contact and reduced oak use, while the rieslings have the trademark Crawford power and drive coupled with the equally typical refinement, minerality and energy. 

5 ★ winery | Crawford River Wines profile | Winery website | @crawford_river_wines

37. Sorrenberg

Sorrenberg is an entrenched star of Beechworth, but that word is far too flashy for owners Barry and Jan Morey, who are defined by their down-to-earth attitude and humble approach. The property is a wonderland, buzzingly alive with plant, animal and insect life. The farming is famously biodynamic, but the sometimes sidelined element of Steiner’s farming principles is no better expressed than here. Many people focus on the biodynamic preparations and their impact on soil, vine and fruit health. Critical things, naturally, but a central tenet is creating a full, dynamic system, one that is synergistic, holistic, where a monoculture like grapevines are incorporated into the broader, biodiverse environment, where they benefit, and where they contribute. Sorrenberg in the full flush of spring and summer seems like the platonic ideal of that concept. It’s hard not to feel it in the wines, too, the gentle caring hand of Barry amongst the vines and in the winery. These are bottlings of the highest quality, feeling not just utterly individual of place but also of steward – a true reflection of terroir.

5 ★ winery | Sorrenberg profile | Winery website

38. Wendouree

There’s arguably no humbler an operation than Wendouree, from its original stone winery and traditional equipment to the demeanour of Tony and Lita Brady. There’s also arguably no Australian winery that elicits as much admiration and respect from the wine community. There’s an affectionate twinkle in the eye when people talk of Wendouree. The unpretentiousness is endearing, of course. It does add to the aura. As does the sense of timelessness. But this is not about nostalgia. It’s about wine quality. But more so, it’s about place. There’s something about the wines from those ancient vines surrounded by scraggly gums that is quintessentially Wendouree. They taste like history, and they age like few others. As James Halliday once said, Wendouree is a "priceless treasure". That is as true now as ever.

5 ★ winery | Wendouree profile

39. Bekkers

If Toby and Emmanuelle Bekkers had just continued with their label working across prime McLaren Vale sites, they would be an easy pick for this country’s best wineries, but they have upped the game significantly. A derelict vineyard in Clarendon (the first planted there in the 1840s, then replanted in the 1990s) on a steep hillside caught their attention. It was a site where they knew they could make elegant, refined wine, a place where cabernet and syrah would excel. The hard work began in 2020, removing invasive species and dead vines, replanting, re-trellising and generally reinvigorating this almost forgotten site. The release of the 2023 Bekkers Clarendon wines, a syrah and a cabernet, are the first rewards of that hard work. They are wines of immense grace and detail, intense yet effortless expressions of the very highest order. One can only imagine what riches the future will bring.

5 ★ winery | Bekkers profile | Winery website | @bekkerswine

40. Agricola Vintners

Callum Powell sports a famous name in wine (son of Torbreck founder Dave Powell), but he is neither shaded nor constricted by it, making his own mark on the wine world in a thoughtful and intuitive way, turning out some of the Barossa’s most exciting wines. New Barossa is a phrase oft used, and it can stand for the shunning of what has come before. That is not his way. Respect. Individuality. Callum has an intimate understanding of the Barossa’s vineyards on macro and micro levels, seeing their possibilities through his unique lens. It’s not about what others do, but rather what he can. The 2024 suite is superb, all whole bunch, all effortlessly pure and endlessly detailed. And the label is only seven years old. What a future. As Dave Brookes says, "Jeez, the Barossa is in good hands."

5 ★ winery | Agricola Vintners profile | Winery website | @callum_powell

41. Lethbridge Wines

Lethbridge took out the inaugural Wildcard of the Year for the 2026 Wine Companion. That’s no surprise to those that know the polymaths Ray Nadeson and Maree Collis. Endlessly inquisitive, restive, and happily so, always trying new things, stretching limits, seeing what is possible. That Wildcard-winning wine is dubbed Yellow, a non-vintage savagnin that spent seven years under flor, an ode to the Jura. It reflects something of the essence of the estate, but nowhere near defines it. Lethbridge’s is a dizzying catalogue, and from fruit near and far. Chardonnay, pinot noir and shiraz, of course, but nebbiolo, dolcetto and aglianico, too. Riesling, dry and not, pinot gris with some skin contact, Bordeaux-style blends, honouring both Right and Left Banks. Plus, museum releases. You could be mistaken for thinking that a roster like this implies some are an afterthought, but every wine in the stable feels considered, has its place and deserves it. In the 2026 Companion, Philip Rich accorded the submissions 14 gold medal scores, and if you consider that they also make compellingly distinct sparkling wine under the Nadeson Collis banner, you could add three more to the tally. Lethbridge is a treasure trove of brilliantly individual wines.

5 ★ winery | Lethbridge Wines profile | Winery website | @lethbridge_wines

42. Rieslingfreak

Riesling evangelists John and Belinda Hughes have grown their label into one of this country’s most recognisable, with reliably excellent wines across the dozen or so distinctly different bottlings. It’s a touchstone for the grape, exploring the possibilities with all manner of renderings, from sparkling to fortified, but at its heart lies a classic story built on pristine fruit and impeccable balance. Sourcing from both the Clare and Eden Valleys, the pair pursue intensity but always with an eye to purity, taking early press cuts and, especially in warmer years, drawing off only the finest of the free run. Rieslingfreak do make aspirational rieslings, wines from select parcels, including the Grounds of Grandeur, which is wild fermented in large oak, but the overarching theme here is excellence and accessibility. Most of the wines are democratically affordable, while being category leaders for quality and character. John and Belinda love riesling, like really love it, and they want you to love it as much as they do. You can feel that in every wine they make.

5 ★ winery | Rieslingfreak profile | Winery website | @rieslingfreakofficial

43. Pooley Wines

Pooley has taken on a talismanic quality in the Tasmanian wine scene, with the quality and range of chardonnay, pinot noir, riesling and syrah all in the elite category. Rarely does a maker go so deep on all these fronts and succeed so spectacularly. The two key sites, Cooinda Vale and Butcher’s Hill, provide variation with their distinctive site signatures, then careful block and fruit selections and focused techniques layer in a top-tier range, celebrating the best of the best from any given vintage. Winemakers Anna Pooley and Justin Bubb divide and conquer to some degree, with each having their specialities but also crossing over. Outside of the more rarefied bottlings, the cream label non-vineyard designate wines are reliably outstanding. The Pooley foundation was laid by Anna’s grandparents in 1985, with the estate and its reputation cultivated considerably under her parents’ governance, but it is in the last decade that Pooley has become one of the great names in Australian wine.

5 ★ winery | Pooley Wines profile | Winery website | @pooleywines

44. MMAD Vineyard

The four horsemen of MMAD Vineyard – Martin Shaw, Michael Hill Smith MW, Adam Wadewitz and David LeMire MW – could not have timed their entry into McLaren Vale any better, purchasing an old site in Blewitt Springs as interest in the district was starting to really heat up. That it had cabernet planted and a decent amount of shiraz didn’t distract from the core aim of working with old vine grenache and chenin blanc in deep sandy soils. Some of the cabernet ends up in rosé, which in its third iteration is the best yet, and now up there with the finest in the region. The grenache and chenin have lived up to expectations, exceeded them, perhaps, but while never a core focus, the surprise packet has been shiraz. With a full season of management of the vineyard, the 2022 release was revelatory, and the ’23 confirmed its class. Four wines only, all top class and utterly distinctive wines of place. MMAD has only bottled four vintages, but it canters into the Top 100.

5 ★ winery | MMAD Vineyard profile | Winery website | @mmadvineyard

45. Jasper Hill

The late 20th century is replete with modern Victorian wine pioneers, breaking ground in areas new and resurrecting those forgotten. In Heathcote, Jasper Hill was not the first, but it was certainly lonely back in 1975 when Ron and Elva Laughton planted in those famous red Cambrian soils. In those dry and rugged conditions, they carved out a legendary reputation making wines of striking depth and intensity, while tasting like nothing else at the time. They were distinctly Heathcote, but also ineffably Jasper Hill. While many an early winery has been bought and sold, or receded out of view, Jasper Hill thankfully is experiencing the most sympathetic of transitions, with Emily McNally (née Laughton) and her husband, Nick, running the family estate. Her Occam’s Razor and Lo Stesso labels have been folded into the mix, with the latter one of the country’s best renditions of fiano (the 2025 was rated 96). The release of the 2024 Nebbiolo, Emily’s Paddock and Georgia’s Paddock reaffirm the status of this legendary name – all three wines achieved gold-medal scores, with the latter registering 97 points from Jeni Port.

5 ★ winery | Jasper Hill profile | Winery website | @jasperhillwines

46. Gentle Folk

Gareth and Rainbo Belton are an intensely focused duo. With PhDs in marine science, the pair were eminently employable, and likely gainfully so, but like so many, the allure of wine and farming it from the ground up was too great. Today, they farm five sites in the Adelaide Hills, working organically and prioritising soil health with cover crops, compost and mulching. They also source from other premium sites, with the growers some of the best in the Hills, including Erinn Klein and Michael Downer. The pair still make the vin de soif wines that put them on the map, but these are no afterthoughts, instead made with the utmost care and attention to detail. Then comes the excellent range of varietal grower wines, typically off multiple sites. That range has highlighted just how exciting sangiovese in the Hills, spawning a superb elevated bottling from the Turnbull Family Vineyard in Charleston. The cornerstone of Gentle Folk, though, is a range of single vineyard wines of both chardonnay and pinot noir, largely from vineyards they farm themselves. Half a dozen golds were awarded by Katrina Butler in the 2026 Companion for the 2023 vintage, which was a challenging one in the region, further underlying the class at this address. This is one of the most exciting producers in the region, making unforced, detailed wines that speak of site and season. 

5 ★ winery | Gentle Folk profile | Winery website | @gentlefolkwine

47. Clonakilla

The Kirk family’s Clonakilla is undoubtedly the Canberra District’s most famous name, a producer that has taken a youthful wine region to the rest of Australia and the world. And to do so, it had to break through many barriers. Firstly, it had to prove that the area could produce wine with the pedigree of the long-established and storied regions. And then, that a refined, spice laden and medium-weighted expression of shiraz could be put on a pedestal with the revered wines of the time, many of them built on power and saturated depth. Tim Kirk took on that challenge after his father’s foresight to plant in an area that conventional wisdom deemed too cold to grow grapes. It was famously a visit to Côte-Rôtie that inspired Tim to embrace a refined style, but also to blend in a little viognier that his father had earmarked for white wine. The rest, as they say... Clonakilla is as important now as it ever has been for the region, making a range of excellent shiraz bottlings, including their iconic shiraz viogner, as well as compelling straight viognier and one of the region’s best rieslings. 

5 ★ winery | Clonakilla profile | Winery website | @clonakillawines

48. Stefano Lubiana

The Lubiana vineyard in Granton is nearing its 35th birthday. It’s in its own micro-climatic pocket, unaffected by frost, warmer than the rest of the Derwent Valley and less prone to disease. That last factor likely contributing, along with a lot of hard work, to the ability to successfully transition to biodynamic certification – the first to do so in Tasmania. For the last few years, Steve Lubiana has been joined in vineyard and winery by his son Marco, who has his own eponymous label, and an already lauded one at that. Steve had always set out to make refined sparkling wines, moving with his wife, Monique, from the mainland to pursue that dream. Today, Stefano Lubiano make an extensive range of vintage and non-vintage cuvées, with the 2011 Prestige crowned the 2026 Halliday Sparkling Wine of the Year. If this was the sole focus, they would be justly acclaimed, but the Lubiana portfolio is broad ranging, from classic and less-common varieties, a delve into alternative vessels and skin contact, plus a suite of pinot noirs, from the Estate and Primavera through a range of single-block bottlings. That pack is about to grow, too, with a high-density block planted on a steeper slope coming online. There’s an abundance of riches to be had here. 

5 ★ winery | Stefano Lubiana profile | Winery website | @stefanolubianawines

49. Dappled Wines

Shaun Crinion’s Dappled is such a compact operation, a solo labour of love, and one that consistently produces micro-batch wines that always overdeliver. Based in the Yarra Valley, with occasional forays to the Mornington Peninsula, Shaun generally makes around 1000 cases – a mere drop in the wine ocean. Those bottlings are carefully considered to the last detail, right down to the refined packaging. Shaun’s career has taken him to some of the most revered regions around the world, including in Burgundy and California, where he first took to winery work. His broad experience shows in his subtly detailed and effortless wines, with a quiet assurance in the making. Of the six wines submitted to the 2026 Companion, five received gold-medal scores, with the single-vineyard chardonnay and pinot noir pair both awarded 97 points by Philip Rich, while the single vineyard syrah was one point back. Shaun is a quietly considered maker at the top of his game, and his extremely limited wines must be hunted down on release, lest you miss out.

5 ★ winery | Dappled Wines profile | Winery website | @dappled_wines

50. Mulline

The Mulline story is paved with gold. No, the Bens Mullen and Hine are not independently wealthy, instead pouring everything into their six-year-old operation, which is based in Sutherlands Creek but sources from across the region. The 2026 Companion recorded no less than 19 golds for the Bens, and it was a similar story in the 2025 Companion. Quality and consistency. That’s not easy to achieve, especially given the youth of the label. Young it may be, but the sense of purposefulness, the commitment and belief in the region and the drive to make the best wine possible is palpable. Single site wines are a key part of the message, highlighting the complexity of the region, but the labels carrying variety alone (some are multi-site blends, and some single sites) are crafted with as much care and consideration, and represent superb value. Chardonnay and pinot noir may be the bedrock, but the fumé blanc and syrah bottlings are their equal, wines of extraordinary depth and detail. Mulline may only be six years old, but it is a firmly established superstar.

5 ★ winery | Mulline profile | Winery website | @mullinevintners

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