The museum release tasting experience at Howard Park

17.07.2024

Not all wines are created equally. Every now and then you come across a drop that takes you on a journey or transports you to another time and place. Sometimes you taste a wine so magnificent it feels akin to a spiritual experience – where all you want to do is sit still for a moment, bask in its glory and pay respect to its creators.

Museum wines are often like that and at Howard Park winery in Margaret River, they’ve built the perfect place to appreciate them.

“The wine chapel is a place to worship wine,” says cellar door manager, Larissa Dalli Cani, as we enter the chapel inspired by the tasting rooms of California’s Napa Valley and the Champagne houses of France. “The Burch family wanted a bespoke area, somewhere special for events and where people could come to relax and enjoy some of their best wines with the view.”

It’s a brilliant blue-sky day on a crisp winter’s morning in the Margaret River Region. As we step into the sacred space that’s reserved for sampling exceptional wine, mid-morning light streams ethereally through the chapel’s tall glass windows that provide an outlook to native forest and vines planted almost 30 years ago.

With vineyards in both the Margaret River and Great Southern regions of Western Australia, the pioneering family has won multiple awards under the Burch Family Wine umbrella. Producing quality-focused wines that are a tribute to people and a reflection of the Burch’s winemaking philosophy, it’s here at the Leston property in the Wilyabrup subregion of Margaret River that visitors can sample the Iconic wines of Howard Park.

“Howard Park’s Icon wines are named after members of our family who have played significant roles in the winery’s nearly four-decades-long history,” says Howard Park owner and CEO, Jeff Burch.

Described as elegant and age-worthy, a flight of Howard Park’s Icon range will usually include the Bordeaux-style Abercrombie Cabernet Sauvignon, Allingham Chardonnay and A.S.W Cabernet Shiraz, plus a carefully curated selection of wines from the museum cellar, that highlight over three decades of history.

While Allingham Chardonnay, from the family’s vineyard in Karridale, was inspired by Jeff’s grandmother, who he says is remembered for her quiet strength, warmth, elegance and youthful outlook, the Abercrombie Cabernet Sauvignon was named in honour of Jeff’s great-grandfather and made using the best fruit from the Leston Vineyard in Margaret River.

“The Abercrombie Cabernet Sauvignon is named after my great-grandfather and mentor, Walter Abercrombie, who taught me a lot about growing things and how to manage through the different seasons to achieve a wonderful crop,” Jeff says.

And as the first wine to pay tribute to the relatives of Howard Park co-owner, Amy Burch, the A.S.W blend is a nod to the varietal preferences and support of her parents, Annie and Alex Wee.

“My mother, Annie loved wines too. Having been brought up in boarding school by French nuns who always had a little wine with their meals, she developed a lifelong appreciation for wine,” Amy says. “And my father, Alex loved a bigger red wine, so this blend is a Cabernet Shiraz in their honour.

While the small batch Icon wines celebrate people, Howard Park’s Heritage and Distinguished Sites ranges are a testament to terroir, with the winery’s current release resiling, chardonnay, shiraz, pinot noir and cabernet sauvignons examined and compared with limited releases pulled from the museum cellar.

“Our Heritage tasting is a private tasting in the chapel where guests have the luxury of having the whole space to themselves,” Larissa says. “Paired with a grazing board made up of local produce, visitors are guided through the wines by a member of the cellar door team who also find out what wines people are interested in and tweak the tasting to their preferences.”

Poured into bespoke glasses, made to accentuate varietal characteristics, a Heritage wine tasting might include Howard Park’s original whites such as an aged resiling that demonstrates the variety’s potential for complexity and is reflective of the cool climate and soil structure of the Great Sothern vineyards in which the grape is grown.

At the end of the experience, guests in the chapel are then left to enjoy their favourite bottle amid intimate and peaceful surroundings.

Of the overall tasting experience itself, Larissa says what strikes people the most is the opportunity for a personalised journey with rare and special wines in the place where they have been carefully preserved, offering insight into the evolution of a benchmark Australian winery. “People love the fact they can come and try a 28-year-old Margaret River Cabernet Sauvignon that’s been perfectly aged in our cellar,” says Larissa. “There’s not many places you can go to sample a back vintage like that.”

Proof that good things really do come to those who wait.

Bookings and further details for Howard Park’s Cellar Door Icon wine flight and Heritage Wine Tasting in the Chapel are available via howardparkwines.com.au.