Tyrrells Wines, Hunter Valley

The Tyrrell family has owned the Hunter Valley property since 1858 when they planted Syrah and Semillon from the James Busby collection and produced the first vintage in 1864. Wine was not the focus until the 1960s when Murray Tyrrell set up a cellar door and a mail order business, based around special selection wines under numbered Vat labels. Among these, from 1963, was the Vat 1 Semillon that has become one of the most awarded white wines in Australia. Tyrrells also pioneered Pinot Noir and Chardonnay with some of the earliest commercial releases of each in the country in the 1970s.

Tyrrells started a program of investigation of the suitability of his vineyards to particular varieties and purchased ancient vineyards when they became available. This led to the Sacred Sites range all from vines over 100 years old. Next generation Bruce Tyrrell hid 1,000 cases of 1989 Vat 1 from his father, releasing it in 1996 to show the benefits of age on Hunter Semillon. The practice continues to this day. Tyrrells owns a large proportion of the oldest vineyards in the Hunter – the other main landowner of old vineyards is Mount Pleasant – and produces outstanding wines from these, sadly in very limited quantities.

We offer the following wine from Tyrrell’s Wines:

• Tyrrell’s Vat 9 Shiraz, Hunter Valley
• Tyrrells Wines, Vat 1 Semillon, Hunter Valley