"You never know you're going to get boned until you do": Bicknell out at Oakridge
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I'm Campbell Mattinson – former chief editor of Halliday Wine Companion, founder of The Winefront, and wine reporter for over 25 years. The world of wine has grown so huge and so diverse that it's become clogged and confusing. This site pares it back: independent reviews and stories of Australian wine, kept real, kept clear, kept honest.
Campbell Mattinson.
Latest Wine Reviews
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"Every day I open bottles of wine at my office and think: this is someone’s land, someone’s story, someone’s heart."
Campbell Mattinson.
Latest Stories
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"Wine at its most essential is a simple story, written in soil, onto our hearts."
Campbell Mattinson.
Latest News
Winemaker Portraits
Latest: 10-Star Wineries
Featured Wines
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Alkina Estate Grenache 2025
Alkina Estate Grenache 2025 is a totally gorgeous wine and after one healthy sip I was totally onboard.
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Clonakilla Viognier 2025
One of the best white wines of the year might well be a viognier grown in the Canberra District.
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Patrick Sullivan Bull Swamp Chardonnay 2025
This Gippsland-grown wine is an elite class Australian chardonnay.
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Xanadu Reserve Chardonnay 2024
You’d never know that 2024 was a tough vintage. This is an outstanding wine, and then some.
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Outstanding release of Kaesler's iconic Old Bastard Shiraz
The 2022 release of Kaesler Old Bastard Shiraz is sensationally good.
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Vignerons Schmolzer & Brown Fiano 2025
This Vignerons Schmolzer & Brown wine is a masterclass on high quality fiano.
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Adelina Polish Hill River Smith Riesling 2025
“It’s the dry. slatey aspect of the finish, in context, that really beguiles and really emphasises this wine’s presence.”
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Leeuwin Estate Art Series Chardonnay 2023
This is a classic movie, in the form of a wine, in a glass. If you buy some you’ll have a great wine in your cellar.
Latest: Penfolds
Portrait of Georgian winemaker, Iago Bitarishvili
Past Features
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My Marco Lubiana journey starts now
Marco Lubiana has had his own wine label since 2018, but I’m only catching up with it now.
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Georgia's Ori Marani
The thing about elegance is that it allows you to stop and it allows you to breathe. In that sense elegance is an enabler. This thought came to me at a stand-up tasting in Tbilisi in Georgia recently, where I discovered the wines of Ori Marani.
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Peter Dredge is not a winemaker by accident
When Peter Dredge was seventeen years old he was resting by the side of an athletic track in Adelaide when he was hit in the head with a discus. This is the story of “Dr.Edge”.
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The cellar, the boxes, and the wine of our life
I had a health scare recently. I was so concerned that I called a doctor, out of hours, to my house, late at night. The doctor who came noticed the wine bottles everywhere.
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Iago Bitarishvili: Portrait
It would be hard to find an individual who has had more influence over the fortunes of a nation’s wines than Georgian winemaker Iago Bitarishvili.
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The wines that will endure, will be the real. And for this real, we will crave.
Campbell Mattinson
"A smash of shells, a crush of citrus" — Campbell Mattinson's 97-point review of Mount Pleasant Cellar Aged Lovedale Semillon 2021.