Karina Dambergs grew up on the vineyard her grandparents started after they emigrated from Germany and Latvia. Like many viticultural child labourers, she swore she'd do something else..
Meet Karina: viticultural child labourer, artistic scientist, intrepid traveller.
Despite studying chemical engineering initially, Karina soon ended up working in a winery lab. With an aptitude for science and an intuition for winemaking, this former ballet scholar traded the pointes for gumboots, and went on to study winemaking and viticulture at CSU, winning the 2001 ASVO prize for external study.
Karina made wine in four states of Australia as well as France (Champagne) and Italy (Le Marche), producing quantities ranging from 20 to 40,000 tonnes, before discovering her passion for making Tasmanian sparkling, a passion she now shares with a lucky few each vintage.
Clover Hill’s a popular destination for overseas student winemakers, with stories about Karina’s crew “eating off the land” throughout the 2010 vintage, hunter-gathering both fauna and flora each night for dinner.
Oh, and if you’re playing pub trivia, you definitely want this girl on your team!