Coming Soon: Vinteloper Rises From the Ashes With an Ambitious New Cellar Door and Tasting Room

Photo: Courtesy of Vinteloper

In 2019, fire ripped through the vineyard and its 100-year-old homestead. Next month, the House of Vinteloper will rise from the ruins – with wine flights, property tours, and tasting plates designed by chef Shannon Fleming.

When Broadsheet shared Vinteloper’s plans for an ambitious tasting room on an idyllic Cudlee Creek property back in 2018, winemaker David Bowley described the project as “a long game”. He didn’t know how accurate that would turn out to be.

On December 20, 2019, the 30-hectare property was razed by the Cudlee Creek bushfire, destroying 12 hectares of vines, vital infrastructure like posts and irrigation, and a 1920 homestead two of his employees were living in.

Five years on, Bowley and his wife Sharon Hong have quietly rebuilt from the ground up, transforming the ruins of the farmhouse into a formidable new cellar door and tasting room opening on September 26 as The House of Vinteloper.

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“People look at it and go, ‘That’s a massive tragedy, how do you pick yourself up?’ … But if I’d won Powerball on December 20, I still would have turned up at work the next day and done the same thing,” Bowley tells Broadsheet. “I didn’t want to be defined by that event, I didn’t want to be that brand that had all that promise.”

The House of Vinteloper will be the first official home for the 16-year-old brand – besides its presence at Lot 100. And you can expect a much more intimate “touchpoint” for the label, from wine flights in the tasting room, which overlooks rows of chardonnay vines, to more immersive experiences like vineyard tours. To eat, there’ll be tasting plates designed by chef Shannon Fleming (Lot 100, Mismatch Brewing Co), “all with this incredible north view out over the vineyards and northern Adelaide Hills,” says Bowley.

The build – designed by Adelaide’s Detail Studio alongside Melbourne’s Studio Beal, with input from Hong, who’s behind Vinteloper’s label art – is a show of resilience and renewal, integrating some of the farmstead’s original masonry work, which withstood the fire, and several charred timber beams reclaimed as “totem poles” that greet visitors in three locations.

“It’s a pretty historic homestead in the local region – I’ve lost count of the number of people who said they had an association with that house,” he says. “Being on the top of the hill, it’s pretty prominent. So when it burnt down, to Sharon’s credit, she was like, ‘Don’t demolish it, you can’t replace what’s there – that authenticity and that history’.”

“It’s a federation-style, 100-year-old building, it was gorgeous,” adds Hong. “It’s so typical and so identifiable as a Hills homestead, with the red brick and wrap around verandah.”

Sustainability is key to the build, which also features a 22-kilowatt solar system to support off-grid power; electric vehicle charging; and a “bushfire fighting system”, which includes sprinklers across the exterior of the building and throughout the grounds. Bowley and Hong have also planted over 2000 native plants on the property, which aligns with Vinteloper’s broader ethos of regenerative agriculture. “Bushfire is part of the normal ecosystem, so planting natives that will withstand that was really important to us,” says Hong.

The rebuild isn’t the only thing she and Bowley have navigated the past few years. Since the fire, they’ve withstood the pandemic, the cost of living crisis, and welcomed two children. “So this has really been a long time coming,” says Hong. “But in a way, that’s been beneficial for us because we’re really sure of the vision, we’ve settled on something that exemplifies the brand, that will be an enjoyable experience for the customer, and adds something to the Adelaide Hills.”

The House of Vinteloper will open on September 26.

vinteloper.com.au
@vinteloper

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