approach
At thousand candles we have always aimed to capture the essence and detail of our unique vineyard in the wines we produce.
thousand candles approach
At thousand candles we have always aimed to capture the essence and detail of our unique vineyard in the wines we produce.
Our primary focus is to ensure that the fruit we grow comes from the healthiest vines. This means our soil has to be in the best possible condition.
The aim is to have an extremely healthy and well balanced soil. Soil health is achieved through the balance of physics, chemistry and biology. This enables the plants to better access the required water and nutrients, suppress plant pathogens and allow vines to increase their root growth.
Understanding how the soil microbes and ecosystem below the surface works is vital. Having a large and diverse range of beneficial microbes means the system is always in good balance and can better buffer itself against extreme weather conditions such as prolonged hot, dry spells or cold and wet conditions.
This management system has enabled us not to rely on herbicides, heavy pesticides and synthetic fertilisers to grow our fruit. We take a holistic approach to managing the vineyards by looking after the soil, the vines and the undervine grasses and clovers. We want a healthy and diverse system – not a sterile monoculture that exists in many mainstream, conventional vineyards.
This biological farming approach produces fruit and wines that best express the truth of where they have come from and the influence of the seasons. We continually find that flavours come on early in the fruit with ideal sugar levels balanced with high natural acid.
Our winemaking follows on from our vineyard approach allowing the fruit to express itself with minimal intervention.
All the wines from thousand candles are made from 100% estate grown, hand picked fruit. We pick in the cool of the morning and process that day.
Our estate name ‘thousand candles’ is taken from the nineteenth-century account of the local land that harks back to the country’s original, indigenous people. A ceremony granting free passage of the bush to the lands around our property was witnessed by a European settler, who, referring to the tribesman dramatically holding aloft their firesticks, remarked that it was if the ‘twilight of the evening had been interrupted by a thousand candles…’
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