Gilles Lapalus in conversation
One beautiful crisp autumnal morning I meet Gilles outside the old hospital in Castlemaine, the home to Maine FM radio station. He’d kindly asked me to chat about evolving wine tourism with him and Mary Macintyre (Superhero Banh Mi) on their Saturday morning Food for Thought radio show. Alongside our conversation we discussed the best recipes for Jerusalem artichokes and what wines pair well (Pinot Noir or Nebbiolo in case you’re interested). Working up quite an appetite Gilles and I headed into town for a warming coffee at the Austrian kaffeehaus. After notifying the government of our whereabouts (the times we live in) I turned the questions on Gilles. I’d met him once before in Melbourne at Cumulus Up, where I tried all his wines and loved them. Too busy to chat that day, I finally pinned him down to ask a few questions.
How did a Burgundy boy end up in Castlemaine?
After studying winemaking at university I looked to escape my home town, setting my sights as far away as possible and it just so happened I’d recently met a French chap who had just done ’86 vintage at Balgownie in Bendigo, Australia. I was working for a magazine at the time, so before I left I agreed to be their reporter overseas. I landed in Sydney and spent the first three days working vintage at Rosemount in the Hunter Valley, with Philip Shaw of all people. It was the end of the 80’s, fat chardonnay era and I was charged with preparing the barrels. Whilst waiting for the grapes in Bendigo I spent three weeks in Rutherglen at a vineyard called Mount Prior and after I spent a week at Yarraburn in the Yarra Valley. All these companies were small and independent back then, soon to be bought out by the big companies.
Then I met James Tanner, an English chap, also from an English wine merchant family and we travelled together from Victoria to Adelaide for one month. I had a Holden Kingswood and we both had contacts. We visited hundreds of wineries, it was really really interesting trip. In the meantime I met my partner, the daughter of Stuart Anderson at Balgownie. I was in Australia for 6 months before returning to do vintage in France, at Château Lagrange, owned by Suntory, and after that; Chile in South America at a place called Los Vascos. The big companies seem to have followed me everywhere, whilst I was there Château Lafite Rothschild bought it. They offered me a job but I still wanted to travel, so that’s what I did.
I went to America but I was too late for vintage in California and I didn’t have the right contacts, so I ended up working in a French restaurant in San Francisco. It was the end of the ‘80s, so a lot of fun! After, I spent some time back in France as a wine journalist, before moving to Italy for a year where I worked with the wine consultant Maurizio Castelli in Tuscany. Finally, I returned back to Burgundy where I managed a domaine in the Mâcon area for two years. After that I had a little crisis and decided I had had enough of wine. I steered down the education path, becoming one of the early teachers in taste education for school children in France. I pursued that for four years, in parallel I developed a tasting consultancy. We tasted everything, wine, chocolate, meat, all sorts! I was doing vintage with friends in Burgundy during those years and by the end of the 90s I really wanted to go back to winemaking. I was looking for something in the South of France; there were a couple of projects; a proposal in Turkey, one in South Africa then I came to visit my partner’s family here in Australia for Christmas and Stuart Anderson was working on a project here at Sutton Grange and said they were looking for a winemaker. Boom. Rather than the south of France, it was the south of the globe and I’ve never moved too far since. When I arrived at Sutton Grange, it was 2001 and there were just two blocks of young vines. From that we developed the winery, the label and more vineyards. I was there for 15 years, but along the way I developed some side projects; Bespoke Brothers with Nick Stock, then in 2011 I started making vermouth. It was only ever meant to be side project but by 2014 we were making 10,000 bottles of vermouth. I always liked making wine though, so I developed the labels you know today; Bertrand Bespoke and Maison Lapalus.
How much do you think the wine industry has changed since the 80’s?
Oh, hugely. The 80’s was Parker era, it was fat chardonnay. In ’84 I saw a conference in Bordeaux at Vinexpo where all the Yarra Valley was for sale. Tony Jordan was begging people to buy up the Yarra Valley. Look at it now? Back then there was no Yerring Station, Levantine Hill, Dominique Portet. The scene has changed completely, take Mornington for example. In the 80’s it was all about Bordeaux, so everyone planted Cabernet. And now Mornington is all about Burgundy. It’s a shame as identity is so easily lost to the latest fashion. We should be asking what we have that is unique, not looking to other regions for inspiration. The Pinot Noir obsession right now is crazy. I had an experience at a well known wine store; I was showing all my wines; a guy walking towards my table and asks if I have any Pinot; I say no but I’ve got but before I could start or finish he’d turned around and walked away. That’s bad behaviour but it’s also representational of what people understand about wine. Sure, they do amazing work there but so do the people in Côte Rôtie, in Barolo, in the South of France; everywhere. And the price is ridiculous. I can’t afford premium cru from burgundy and what’s worse, all the people who want to study wine, they can’t either, so no one can taste Grand Cru Burgundy.
What identity do your wines have in your portfolio?
You know, a few of the things I’ve done in Australia have fronted the trends. I was one of the first to use the concrete egg, to make a pet nat, then the vermouth and at the moment it’s piquette, which if you don’t know about now, you’ll know it in two months when it will be all over Melbourne. The best way to describe piquet is kombucha with grapes. It’s a very old concept which actually means ‘bad, low alcohol wine, on the way to vinegar basically’ in French. But it has a strong history; it’s a wine -well, hardly a wine- a beverage made from the fermented skins after pressing which you infuse with water, then extract a little bit of sugar and alcohol through it. You end up with a refreshing beverage with about 5% alcohol, a bit of tannin and a bit of colour. It goes back to the Medieval times, when the European vineyards were owned by the aristocracy, and all the wine was made for them so the peasants who lived on the land were only left with the skins. Back then water was more poisonous than alcohol would’ve been, so it made sense. It was my beverage of choice during vintage, it’s so refreshing! I was making it for friends about two years ago, when a couple of hipsters in New York started to make it, and it’s grown from there. It’s a wonderful drink and a great alternative if you don’t want too much alcohol. I make one from Greco, Nebbiolo and Syrah.
What’s your tipple when not drinking piquet during vintage?
Oh, wine. I drink lots of different wine; last night we had a nice Beaujolais from Morgon which was interesting. Before that a very interesting Grenache from Collioure from the South West. I don’t have a regional preference, just anything that is good. Oh, and Sherry, I love sherry.
They say Sherry is having a comeback?
They’ve been saying that for 20 years…but what’s happening with Sherr today, there’s a new generation making non-fortified wines and they’re amazing. I went to Spain and made a pet nat from the palomino grape which normally goes into Sherry, it was really interesting.
What do you love about the wine world the most?
I’ve always been really curious; because I wasn’t tied to a vineyard I could always explore the bigger picture. There was a magazine in Mâcon called Revue de Oenologue, I knew some people so I helped them with events and conferences and through that I got to meet all the grandfathers of oenology like; Emile Peynaud, Pierre Galet and Jules Chauvet who was the godfather of natural wine. They’re all dead now but they’re the reason oenology is what it is today and it opened up the scope of wine to me. I’d studied winemaking at university but you don’t have to nowadays. The internet makes anything possible, for example; there’s a new baker in Castlemaine; he was a chef but during covid he didn’t have a job so he taught himself how to make bread on YouTube and now he’s got a bakery; and the bread is great. And winemaking is exactly the same! As long as you have a passion and interest in wine and you know where you want to go, it’s not that complicated really. With experience comes confidence but most new winemakers on the block are people outside of the industry and they’re often very interesting winemakers! There’s so much to learn too, through winemaking you can study geology, history, agriculture, agronomy, oenology, chemistry, you can study how to make glass bottle, printing on labels, marketing, sales…everything. It’s so broad, I’m always learning and I love that. I also love that it all starts from the land. I love working with nature. It keeps you humble and humility is important in a winemaker.
What do you dislike about being a winemaker?
The paperwork! Especially if you export to the USA. But, no the hardest thing is you’re totally dependent on nature. Like last week in Europe (the disastrous spring frost), you do all this work and in one night it’s gone. And that’s the thing; you asked previously about the evolution of the industry, now you can’t miss a vintage. You have to have a good vintage every year to be survive economically. If you go back 50 years; you had one good vintage, then a few bad vintages because there weren’t all the tools we have to correct now. Economically wine went on a longer cycle as well; so you could spread your risk. Today, the people in Burgundy worry about not having enough wine to sell, like this year, they will have very little crop, they have no wine stock. What do they do?
What do they do?
Well, they’re quite rich. But that’s not always the case. The clever ones have invested in vineyards in the Mâcon, in the south of France, in California; other places. Or, even better, they’ve invested in beef, forestry, chickens to diversify their risk. Monoculture is a disaster and you see it more and more, especially here in Australia. You need diversification; so whilst wine is important it’s also important to have sheep to eat your grass, different plants to encourage biodiversity.
Let’s talk trends; natural wine, low alcohol drinks and anything else that’s on your mind…
Are we starting that conversation?!! Let’s start with natural wine; it’s all about knowing the history of the process and where it’s come from. Oenology was born in the ‘60s, and over time new processes emerged; there was sulphur, the miracle powder; filtration, the miracle solution. The new technologies helped reduce risk and ensured wine could be made year after year. Soon it became the norm and no one questioned the alternatives. I’m from the Mâcon area which is very near to Beaujolais so I knew Marcel Lapierre, I met Jules Chauvet; all the guys who brought natural winemaking to the fore, and back then they weren’t even coined as natural winemakers. They were just making wine reflectively, asking the obvious question; why add sulphur? Why filter? They chose to make wine without the new technologies and made beautiful wines. So, as much as I despise the word, I think the movement is really important, but people need to know the history. There’s always people who go too far and send the wrong message to the consumer.
And low alcohol, do I see it as a threat? No. Because history repeats itself; it was a trend in the 70’s, the 80’s. People think they’re inventing the wheel, and it’s like no! If I don’t want alcohol I have a juice, or a tea, a coffee or water! I mean what happened to water!? If you don’t want spirit there’s plenty of other, non alcoholic delicious things. And the technology involved in it is enormous; the energy required for reverse osmosis is a whole other conversation.
What are your plans for the next 10 years?
This year is an interesting one; I got involved with the radio project because I’d like to slow down physically, I’m getting a little tired physically! Then there’s project I did with the artist, Cameron Robinson, which has been really interesting. The project is ongoing and it really inspires me, so lots more ideas to come! Watch this space. I think there’s enough wine in the world already. I make enough to make a living, and to have my own drink. I’m really proud of doing the Vermouth and the piquette, you know, it’s all be really pleasing.
If someone was to describe you in one sentence what would that be.
Crazy! I don’t know; that’s not for me to answer. People see me as someone who has funny ideas. Unfortunately I’m not very good at translating that into a business proposition. But that’s OK; I’m pretty happy where I am.
Stockists….
Prince Wine Store, South Melbourne
Atlas Vinifera, Richmond
Winespeake, Daylesford