Tom Carson
PINOT PERFECTIONIST
For award-winning winemaker Tom Carson, making some of Australia’s best Pinot Noir is not so much a job but an obsession.
Tom revels in the freedom that comes with making wine in Australia and the opportunity to explore new (and old) winemaking techniques. A string of accolades already to his name, Tom joined Mornington Peninsula’s Yabby Lake a little over a decade ago, intrigued by the unrealised potential of the vineyard. These days he’s proving just how good that vineyard is, winning his way around the wine show circuit.
Peninsula pioneer
When the Mornington Peninsula’s Yabby Lake vineyard was first planted around 20 years ago, the brightest minds were brought in to map the soil and put the right vines in the right places. Tom joined the team in 2008, an impressive winemaking career already behind him.
He’d worked in Clare Valley, Yarra Valley, Burgundy and Champagne. He’d been named International Winemaker of the Year at the International Wine & Spirit competition in London and become the youngest chairman of Australia’s National Wine Show. And now he was excited to unearth new possibilities at Yabby Lake.
“The level of detail that went in to establishing the vineyard was something I really haven't seen in a lot of wineries,” he says. “It gives the winemaker every possibility to unlock the potential of the vineyard.”
Yabby Lake is known for its pure, elegant wines, including Pinot Noir – one of the most difficult grapes to grow and wines to make, but a favourite of Tom’s.
“Pinot is one of the greatest varieties going around,” he says. “I think most people don’t start their wine-drinking at Pinot Noir, but most people end up there. It is a really seductive variety.”
Tom describes his passion for winemaking as more of an obsession, and one of his proudest moments came in 2013 when Yabby Lake’s 2012 Block 1 Pinot Noir became the first Pinot to win Australia’s most coveted red wine award, the Jimmy Watson trophy.
“I think for Australian Pinot Noir, we’ve come a long way and we still have so much to achieve,” says Tom. “The sky’s the limit.”
“You just sort of feel like there’s not enough hours in the day. Like you’ve just got to keep going as fast as you can to get it done.”
“For Australian Pinot Noir, we’ve come a long way and we still have so much to achieve. The sky’s the limit.” – Tom Carson
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