Our philosophy is simple: let the fruit do the talking and don’t be afraid to wait. Sometimes the best thing you can do is take your time.
Domaine A was founded on a grand cabernet plan: produce big Bordeaux-inspired reds at the end of the earth. Honour old world ideals in the new world. There were plenty of naysayers. They were politely ignored. These days, our wine garners acclaim as some of the country’s finest, even rivalling the best of Bordeaux.
Our vines are grown over an eleven hectare single vineyard. Cabernet sauvignon, of course, alongside cabernet franc, merlot, petit verdot and pinot noir. As for white? Our Lady A is legendary, inspired by the famous oaked sauvignon blanc of Bordeaux. For a different expression of fruit, method and terroir, we produce younger, more approachable, drink-now styles—red, white, rosé—under the Stoney Vineyard label.
Our approach to winemaking is unyielding. Without compromise. If the fruit isn’t perfect, the wine doesn’t get made. When other vineyards pick fruit out of weather fear, worried about losing fruit to the rain, our winemaker says: No, we wait. In this age of instant gratification, we only release wines at their best. And that can take years. Our dedication runs full circle. Vines are hand-plucked, hand-tied and hand-picked during the cool days of autumn. Wines are pressed down by hand. And by hand, our barrels are racked through the year. From bud burst to bottles leaving the winery, precision and care shape our process.
This is cool-climate wine country. Ancient soil and champagne air. A temperate maritime climate and long hours of sunshine, even over the long cool season. Slow-ripening fruit and aromatic varieties brought forth from our impeccably tended Stoney Vineyard—the oldest in the historic Coal River Valley in southern Tasmania. Each vintage is a constant reflection of this extraordinary, elemental terroir: climate and soil, vineyard and method, founded on 200-million-year-old Jurassic dolerite. These wines have distinct personalities, not constrained by region or varietal typicity.
Here in the valley we tend to our work, but our origins lie in Europe. Our first acre was planted in 1973 by the pioneering George and Priscilla Park, but it wasn’t until Peter and Ruth Althaus acquired Stoney Vineyard in 1989 that Domaine A came into its own. They’d been searching the southern hemisphere for the perfect cool-climate vineyard—an Antipodean answer to the great estates of France and Germany. In Stoney Vineyard, they picked the perfect spot to produce fruit with the intensity and subtlety to rival the storied vineyards of Europe.
When Peter and Ruth retired to Switzerland, Mona creator David Walsh purchased the estate with a mind to honour Domaine A’s celebrated winemaking tradition. Domaine A now runs alongside David’s Moorilla winery situated on-site at Mona, and continues under the custodianship of Moorilla winemaker Conor van der Reest.