Hickinbotham

The Hickinbotham vineyard in the Clarendon district is one of the most respected sites in McLaren Vale. Alan Robb Hickinbotham was Australia's very first lecturer in wine science at Roseworthy College. His son, builder and vigneron Alan David Hickinbotham, planted the vineyard in 1971 on the highest ground in the district. For decades the grapes went to others: the vineyard supplied fruit for iconic wines such as Penfolds Grange and Hardy's Eileen Hardy Shiraz, without ever appearing on the label itself. Only after its purchase by Jackson Family Wines did Hickinbotham gain a name of its own on the bottle. Winemaker Chris Carpenter, known for his Cabernet work in Napa Valley, has since travelled to Australia several times a year to make the wines here. Worth knowing: for decades almost nobody knew that part of the fruit behind Penfolds' most celebrated wine, Grange, came from this single vineyard site.