As the name suggests, Oak Works likes wood; there are no stainless steel tanks to be seen and for that matter neither are there any pumps or filters. Peter likes it that way and believes if a winery operation can be done by hand it will be and the wine benefits.

Having decided to make only red wine from varieties such as Pinotage, Saperavi and Tinta Molle, the carefully selected grapes are molly-coddled from their hand picking to the hand plunged ferment which gently extracts the wonderful colour from the skins and finally on to their basket pressing and maturation in oak.

These are truly handmade wines where fruit characters preserved by gentle handling shine, beacon-like, from the glass. It’s a different approach for the Riverland; an area normally associated with bigger wineries but Oak Works proves that in the Riverland small can be beautiful. And Red.