Yalumba

Samuel Smith arrived in South Australia in 1847 by boat from Wareham in Dorset and settled at Angaston, on land that had been cared for by the Peramangk people. He founded Yalumba in 1849, planting the first vine under moonlight with his son Sidney. He named his family farm Yalumba, a word believed to be from the Peramangk language, meaning "all the country around." In 1852 Smith travelled to Victoria to mine for gold, bought 80 acres of land with the proceeds and released his first wine in 1853. The business passed through proprietors Sidney Smith, Walter Smith and Wyndham Hill-Smith to the fifth-generation proprietor, Robert Hill-Smith. Third-generation Fred Caley Smith set out on a scientific voyage in 1893 and returned with horticultural developments that laid the foundation of Yalumba's sustainable viticulture.

• A large proportion of Yalumba's production was fortified for many years, though the company made dry red wine for decades before The Signature's first vintage in 1962
• Yalumba calls its marble and sandstone Clocktower a monument to its commitment to the Barossa
• In 2024, its 175th year, Yalumba released its first Museum Release of back vintages, with wines aged up to 20 years

The Hill-Smith family has owned and operated Yalumba for over 175 years, and its fifth and sixth generations now guide the business. Robert Hill-Smith, the fifth-generation proprietor, pioneered Viognier in Australia, established Australia's First Families of Wine and launched The Caley in honour of his great uncle Fred Caley Smith. Sixth-generation Jessica Hill-Smith is General Manager of PR & Communications, and Lucy Hill-Smith is based in the UK as a Fine Wine Ambassador, a role Decanter describes as covering the UK and Europe. Sam Wigan joined Yalumba in 2001 and became Head Winemaker in 2023. Louisa Rose, at Yalumba since 1992, is Head of Sustainability and Global Brand Ambassador. Kym Venning is Head Cooper, and Bethany Collins, who joined in 2023, leads the Yalumba Nursery.

• Each year The Signature honours an individual who has made a profound contribution to Yalumba's culture and traditions, personally chosen by Robert Hill-Smith
• The 2022 Signature is dedicated to former Executive Director of Sales Australia & New Zealand Paul Midolo, and the 2023 to Peter Sawrey, who has written The Signature's back label story for every vintage since 1994
• Australia's First Families of Wine, established by Robert Hill-Smith in 2009, is a self-funded group of families running independent family wine businesses

Yalumba's wines draw from the Barossa Valley, Eden Valley and Coonawarra. In Coonawarra, the Menzies Vineyard Retreat and Wine Room at 15542 Riddoch Highway sit among the winery's Menzies vineyards on the outskirts of Penola. Yalumba has been buying and swapping Coonawarra fruit since the 1920s. Yalumba created its Old Vine Charter in 2007; in 2009, with the help of the Barossa Grape & Wine Association, it became an industry-recognised charter. The charter defines an Old Vine as at least 35 years of age, a Survivor Vine as at least 70, a Centenarian Vine as at least 100 and an Ancestor Vine as at least 125. Under it, The Menzies Cabernet Sauvignon is made with Old Vine grapes from vines planted in 1975, The Octavius includes Centenarian grapes from vines planted in 1908 and 1854, and The Tri-Centenary Grenache comes from vines planted in 1889.

• The Tri-Centenary block is two acres of 820 dry-grown bush vines planted in 1889 in the heart of the Barossa Valley, on deep sandy loam over red-brown clay
• The Steeple vineyard at Light Pass is a 1.34 hectare block of own-rooted Shiraz planted in 1919, sitting at 280 metres and biodynamically grown
• The Ming D block in Yalumba's Coonawarra vineyard, 2.7 hectares planted in 1992 with two clones of Cabernet Sauvignon, supplied the 74% Cabernet Sauvignon in The Caley 2021

The Signature is a Barossa Cabernet & Shiraz first released in 1966 with the inaugural 1962 vintage; the 2023 is the 52nd release. For 2023 the Cabernet Sauvignon came from three Barossa Valley vineyards and the Shiraz from three vineyards, the oldest planted in 1935, and the wine matured for 19 months in 22% new French and Hungarian hogsheads and barriques. The Caley blends Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon with Barossa Shiraz; its first vintage, 2012, spent 20 months in French oak and was released in 2017. The Caley 2021 is 74% Cabernet Sauvignon and 26% Shiraz from two Barossa blocks, matured for 18 months in 21% new French oak barriques and hogsheads. The Octavius is named after the 100-litre octave barrels handcrafted on site in the Yalumba cooperage; the 2019 drew on five main Barossa vineyards, with its oldest parcel from Eden Valley vines planted in 1854, and is 55% Eden Valley and 45% Barossa Valley Shiraz. The Virgilius Viognier comes from old vines at the Eden Valley site where, in 1980 and with help from the Yalumba nursery, the first commercial Viognier vines in Australia were planted on a neighbour's vineyard; the grapes are whole-bunch pressed to mature French oak barrels and fermented by wild yeasts.

• The Tri-Centenary Grenache 2024 remained on skins for 373 days after fermentation
• The Steeple Shiraz 2022 matured for 16 months in 15% new Tonnellerie Sylvain 'Artistic Series' barriques
• The first vintage of The Virgilius Viognier was released in 1998
• Other collections include Samuel's Collection, Distinguished Sites, Individuals, Smith's Angaston Whisky, and fortified tawnies with minimum average ages of 21, 30 and 50 years

Yalumba says its wines are made with the least intervention and calls its Wild Ferments collection the truest depiction of wild fermentation, an element of all its wines. Yalumba has achieved 100% vegan-friendly wine status after moving away from animal products such as gelatin, milk and eggs in making its wines. Its coopers have worked since around 1890 and moved into The Cooperage in the 1990s; Yalumba imports its oak and its coopers use a long, slow, medium toast. The Yalumba Nursery, established in 1975, clones, grows and supplies young vines to grape growers around Australia.

• Decanter notes Yalumba is one of the only wineries in Australia with both a vine nursery and its own cooperage
• The term 'octave' was coined by Yalumba's early coopers for a barrel an eighth the size of a standard barrel
• The Nursery was originally intended to cultivate quality vines and maintain Yalumba's own vineyard

Yalumba's native vegetation program preserves, establishes or re-establishes native vegetation over an area equal to its land under vine. In 2016 it installed the largest solar system in an Australian winery at the time, which now generates approximately 24% of its on-site energy requirement. Its Emissions Reduction Roadmap targets a 50% reduction by 2030 and carbon neutrality by 2050 against a baseline year; emissions were down 22% as of 2023. Yalumba has run its own sustainable viticulture program since the 1990s. The Yalumba Wine Room, the cellar door in the Barossa and a former Brandy Bond Store, is open Monday to Sunday from 10am to 5pm, while the Menzies Wine Room in Coonawarra is open by appointment only.

• Cooperage tours show the art of wine barrel making at the winery
• The Signature tour covers the history, symbolism and provenance of The Signature
• The Menzies Vineyard Retreat in Coonawarra can house a maximum of four people

Primary sources (producer's own site): https://www.yalumba.com/yalumba/, https://www.yalumba.com/about-us/, https://www.yalumba.com/our-heritage/, https://www.yalumba.com/the-family/, https://www.yalumba.com/winemaking/, https://www.yalumba.com/the-cooperage/, https://www.yalumba.com/the-nursery/, https://www.yalumba.com/sustainability/, https://www.yalumba.com/old-vine-charter/, https://www.yalumba.com/visit-us/, https://www.yalumba.com/the-wine-room/, https://www.yalumba.com/the-menzies-wine-room-retreat/, https://www.yalumba.com/shop/wines/, https://www.yalumba.com/the-signature-cabernet-sauvignon-and-shiraz-2023/YALSIG236.html, https://www.yalumba.com/the-caley-cabernet-and-shiraz-2021/YALCAL213.html, https://www.yalumba.com/the-octavius-shiraz-wooden-box-2019/YALOCT196WB.html, https://www.yalumba.com/the-tri-centenary-grenache-2024/YALTGR246.html, https://www.yalumba.com/the-virgilius-viognier-2023/YALVIR236.html, https://www.yalumba.com/the-steeple-shiraz-2022/YALSSH226.html, https://www.yalumba.com/archives/news/Yalumba-Blog-Yalumba-Announces-2023-Vintage-Signatory.html, https://www.yalumba.com/archives/news/Yalumba-Blog-Yalumba-Announces-2022-Vintage-Signatory.html. Secondary sources: https://www.decanter.com/wine/producer-profiles/producer-profile-yalumba-374161/, https://www.thedrinksbusiness.com/2024/11/new-world-old-vines-yalumba-at-175/, https://www.decanter.com/wine/south-australia/at-the-table-with-yalumbas-lucy-hill-smith-top-barossa-wine-can-age-almost-indefinitely/. Last verified 2026-10-12. Where the producer's site and a secondary source disagree, the producer's site governs.