Anyone with a passing interest in cool-climate Australia will already know that Garagiste is one of Victoria’s brightest stars. Barnaby Flanders created this label in 2006 following his amicable split with Allies co-founder David Chapman. Cam Marshall joined Barney in 2010, and together, they focus on a range of small-batch Mornington Peninsula wines with an emphasis on single-site, sub-regional expressions of his region.

Flanders’ goal is to work with high-quality, respectably farmed parcels from Tuerong and Moorooduc, in the North (sandy soils), to the more central Merricks and Merricks North (brown loam/red soils) and finally the more elevated and southern subzones of Red Hill and Main Ridge (vibrant red soils). Tuerong is the oldest site that Barney works (planted in the late ‘80s). The Chardonnay here is always picked first, providing a barometer for the progression of the rest of the vintage. The opportunity to work with the Balnarring site came up in 2012 and immediately “had a good feel to it”. It’s his ‘aspirational’ site, providing high-quality fruit that is elevated year after year. 

While both the Tuerong and Balnarring sites play important roles in the Garagiste story, inevitably it is the Merricks Grove vineyard that stars as the headline act. It was here in 2000, that Barney Flanders first began to cut his teeth as a winegrower. Since day one, he has been in control of every aspect of the Merricks vines—with all the advantages that this brings—and today he governs each step from earth to bottle; still a relatively rare phenomenon in the Australian wine scene.

Merricks Grove was planted in 1994 and is the highest of Garagiste’s vineyards. Predominantly south-facing with undulations and variations, the grey sandy loams are marbled with red ironstone, giving Flanders more red dirt than can be found at Tuerong and Balnarring. The grapes also ripen later here, and so, most years Merricks is the last vineyard to be picked. All these factors (altitude, volcanic influence, length of season—and likely more) combine to create Garagiste’s finest, most linear and savoury expressions of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.

The winemaking tenets here are quite simple: precise picking to capture acidity, whole bunch pressing (for the Chardonnay), natural ferments and a maximum of 20 to 35% new oak. Maturation is in large (300 to 500-litre) barrels to make fresher wines for keeping, and the wines are neither fined nor filtered.

Barnaby and Cam manage all aspects of the viticulture and winemaking themselves and a shining range of succulent, finely tuned and elegantly crafted cool-climate Pinot Noir and Chardonnay is what results. Garagiste, the main label, is adeptly supported by delicious entry-level wines under the Le Stagiaire banner. Garagiste’s Pinot Noirs have gorgeous texture whilst remaining composed, fresh and absorbingly complex. The Chardonnays, taut and linear as they are, are also immensely satisfying wines from the top-drawer.