Dog Point

23 Mar 2005 (Viva)

Planned to Perfection

Few in the wine trade would say that now is an auspicious time to start a winery. But James Healey and Ivan Sutherland did not leap head first into Dog Point Vineyards and they did not try and expand too quickly at their winery which is best described, Sutherland says, as the bare bones of a building with the best equipment money can buy.

In their previous incarnations as winemaker (Healey) and viticulturist (Sutherland) at Cloudy Bay Wines, they learned exactly what money could buy so they figured out what they needed. They had also secured markets before they began bottling, relying on contacts made over the years in Australia, Britain and the United States.

One of the keys to the success of Dog Point Vineyards lies in the vineyard itself, they employ 14 fulltime workers to attend to the pampering needed by their close-planted, low-cropped vines. And through they are producing only 8000 cases a year, they own 80ha of vines and keep up with maintenance costs by selling a substantial proportion of grapes to Cloudy Bay Wines.

Their goal is to make 18,000 cases of wines, allowing them to retain the hands-on control of their winery – the one place they do not want to employ anybody else. Most of the planing was done in the evenings when they were working at Cloudy Bay Wines. Both say that the time came then they realised it was now or never, if they were to establish their own winery. If they had left it much longer they would have been unable to keep up with the physical demands of moving barrels and running a winery, says Healey. In a country where many are obsessed with getting age on their vines so that they can bottle more complex-tasting fermented grapes, their partnership is testament to the fact that winemaker age is every bit as important as old vines. There are some grapes harvested from older grapevines in the Dog Point Vineyard’s wines but experience bears far more correlation to the great taste of their latest sauvignon blancs and chardonnay ad newish pinot noir. For most of the four different wines they make they use entirely indigenous yeast fermentation, meaning they are leaving their winemaking in the lap of the gods rather than employing the more prevalent New World hands-on control. And after just three vintages they are already achieving their aim of making Marlborough wines that taste different to the norm. Instead of bottling yet another Marlborough sauvignon blanc that tastes like freshly cut grass, gooseberries or passionfruit, theirs is dominated by body and weight in the mouth – as is their 2003 Dog Point Vineyards Chardonnay, one of the best New Zealand chardonnays I have tasted, it is remarkable that it comes from Marlborough, a region usually renowned for chardonnays with over-the-top acids and pronounced buttery tastes. This chardonnay flouts that busty cleavage style, sporting a far more subtle and European style. It is a chardonnay for those who are supposedly over drinking the stuff. Then there is the pinot noir. It’s more challenging to make than the whites, but Sutherland and Healey are determined to make it a wow-factor red, in time.

Joelle Thomson