Almost a decade after buying Toolangi, Rochford’s Helmut Konecsny has sold the Dixon’s Creek vineyard to its winemaker, Kaspar Hermann.
“With everything that’s happened in the industry of late, particularly the changes in the corporate landscape, we’re very thankful for the opportunity Helmut has created for our family,” Kaspar says.
“It’s also quite a rare situation, being able to buy something that I’ve gotten to know over the last eight vintages,” he adds. “We haven’t gone into it blindly.”
The 11.2ha vineyard, bordering the Toolangi State Forest in the north of the Yarra Valley, was first planted in 1995 to chardonnay, pinot noir and shiraz by founders Garry and Julie Hounsell, and current viticulturist John Evans. Initially, winemaking was outsourced to a prominent list of talent, including Rick Kinzbrunner, Trevor Mast, Matt Harrop, Dave Bicknell and Tom Carson.
One of many changes Helmut instigated after buying the vineyard and label in 2017 was to install Kaspar as permanent winemaker. Since he joined, ahead of the ’19 vintage, Kaspar has worked to refine the range and develop the Toolangi house style, establishing its reputation for site-driven wines of purity and finesse.
“Viticulture is first… viticulture leads the wine,” Kaspar says. “They're very textural, quite flavoursome wines, and we don’t have to add or take anything away from them; the site grows good amounts of natural acid, good amounts of flavour.
“The pinots are often a little more tannic than other Yarra pinots. And the shiraz, in a good year… it’s amazing,” he says.
But chardonnay is the star – particularly the F Block. Cropped from the highest and coolest part of the vineyard, it’s an intensely flavoured, elegant wine. The 2025 vintage, released in September, is described by Philip Rich as “complex” and “beautifully poised”.
Focusing more on chardonnay is one thing Kaspar, who’s already made changes to the vineyard over the past eight years, is keen to do in the future. He’s also renovating the mudbrick cottage on the property with an eye to renting it out for short stays, to hopefully encourage visitation to this “very different part of the Yarra, which doesn’t get a lot of limelight”.
“It has been quite a cool thing to be part of this next phase of Toolangi,” he says.
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