The Waitaki Valley's first winery and cellar door sales outlet will open in November, the culmination of a $2 million development on a former fruit farm near Kurow.
Kurow Estate Ltd has turned a former fruit-packing shed and fruit sales outlet into a quality cellar door retail sales outlet and storage rooms for wines, adding a new winery and receiving area.
It has realised the aim of having total control over all aspects of its wine production from planting the vines and harvesting the grapes to bottling, storage and distribution for its two labels, Pasquale Viticultura and Kurow Village.
"We wanted a fully-integrated system growing our own wines, bottling storage and dispatch at the Kurow winery," Kurow Estate general manager Murray Turner said.
To mark the occasion, the winery and outlet for Kurow Estate's wines will be open over three days from November 6 to 8, starting on the Friday with a news media function, an official opening on the Saturday and public open day on the Sunday.
It will give invited guests and the public the chance to see what has been achieved since October 2007, when work first started, including an opportunity to see the whole operation.
The development has been overseen by Murray and Diana Turner on their former fruit farm, which they sold to Antonio Pasquale, retaining a small area which they have planted in grapes.
The Turner family's association with horticulture goes back four generations and their local knowledge has been combined with the Pasquale family's association with wine, which goes back several generations.
Mr and Mrs Turner built the fruit packing shed, which was also a sales outlet, just east of Kurow on State Highway 83.
Now the area has been transformed, using local contractors and artisans as much as possible.
Stone walls built by Harry Petherick lead to a paved veranda and into the cellar door outlet.
The outlet's floor is spectacular purple heart timber from sustainable forests in French Guyana and the ceiling is white-washed pine.
Mr Petherick also made the floor-to-ceiling stone fireplace, with furniture, the counter and other joinery by Ron Chave, of Otiake.
The tables have inserts and the counter turned columns featuring the same timber as the floor.
During the summer, the outlet will be open seven days a week, offering tastings, wine by the glass and bottle sales.
Food will be available to complement the wine and the outlet will be available for hire for private functions.
In the rear of the building are the temperature-controlled storage rooms for the wine and distribution.
Upstairs are offices, a boardroom and staff facilities.
A receiving area for the grapes has been built to the side to separate trucks from the public car park.
The receiving area also has the white wine press.
Red-wine grapes will be de-stemmed and then put into open-topped fermenters in the tanks room.
That links to the winery with its tanks room, temperature-controlled room for the casks to mature the red wines and a $200,000 bottling plant, which was installed this week.
It will also be available process grapes from other vineyards in the Waitaki Valley where about 110ha has already been planted.
The winery will be capable of handling up to 400 tonnes of grapes a season - equivalent to about 28,000 cases of wine. About half of that - 200 tonnes or 14,000 cases - will come from Kurow Estate vineyards.
Mr Turner said that, for Kurow Estate, it meant all of its wines would be grown and processed within the Waitaki Valley.
The farthest any grapes would have to travel was 29km from the Riverside vineyard in the Hakataramea Valley.
"It's part of the culture of southern people and a point of difference for us," he said.
It also brings new jobs to the community, the complex employing two full-time staff and up to a dozen part-timers at the peak of the season.
The winery is among one of the first in the world to use a system developed by Oritain Global Ltd to track and authenticate the origin of its wines.
Every wine has a unique natural signature from the water and soil where the grapes are grown.
Soil samples of the vineyards have been taken and analysed to establish reference data for the wines' signatures.
Apart from addressing issues of food safety, the system also guarantees to consumers the origin of its wines through independent testing by Oritain on site during bottling.
The wines will have the Oritain logo and a certification number.
Kurow Estate is producing wine under two different labels.
The Pasquale Viticultura label is the premium wine, made almost solely with grapes from the Riverside vineyard.
Under that label are two pinot noirs, an aromatic Alma Mater blend (made from gewurztraminer, pinot gris and riesling), a riesling and and arneis (an Italian white variety).
The Kurow Village label offers good value for money with a pinot noir, pinot gris and a rieslingIn time for the opening, two rosés will be bottled under the Kurow Village brand with labels featuring New Zealand's penny stamp - a Penny Blonde and a Penny Pink.
"The rosés will be good easy drinking", targeted at a market epitomised by summer holidays around the Waitaki lakes.
A portion of the Kurow Village sales goes to the Kurow Heritage Centre museum.
Other wines in the coming year's vintage will be a gewurztraminer, viognier, chardonnay and a sparkling wine.
Kurow Estate Ltd
> New $2 million winery and cellar door near Kurow.
> Official opening November 7, public day November 8.
> 30ha of vineyards in the Hakataramea and Waitaki valleys.
> Two labels, Pasquale Viticultura (premium) and Kurow Village (value).
> Current wines: pinot noir, riesling, arneis, pinot gris, rose and a gewurztraminer-pinot gris-riesling blend.
> To come: gewurztraminer, viognier, chardonnay and sparkling wineThe apricot trees have gone and grapevines now grow on a Waitaki Valley property.
