This is going to sound a bit self-indulgent. I’m about to shamelessly blow the Western Australian fine wine trumpet. It’s not my fault though – I have to blame Cape Mentelle founder, David Hohnen, and Andrew Caillard MW of Langton’s Fine Wine Auctions.

Nine years ago, these two luminaries of the Australian wine industry recognised that a lot of “must-have” wines being produced in the country were coming from WA. These are wines that connoisseurs follow avidly, often of very limited production and incredibly sought-after, making them that most valuable of things – rare. Hohnen and Caillard felt that the time had come to open up these wines to the mercy of market forces and see if they could hold their own.

The result was the establishment of the Langton’s Great Wine Estates (GWE) of Western Australia and the key event is an auction held every two years. Selected by Langton’s, the GWE are chosen for their ability to consistently make wines of exceptional quality that reflect the best varieties of their region. They are Cape Mentelle, Cullen, Devil’s Lair, Howard Park, Leeuwin Estate, Moss Wood, Pierro, Vasse Felix, Voyager Estate and Xanadu from Margaret River, Plantagenet from Mt Barker and Houghton from Great Southern.

Voyager Estate was honoured to host the fifth auction in November 2005. More than just an auction and dinner, guests participated in tutored tastings on Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon, and the wines up for auction were on tasting with the winemakers in the Voyager Estate barrel cellar – the largest underground cellar in WA and normally off limits to the public. These tasting opportunities whet the appetite for not only the auction, but also the dinner prepared by Gold Plate-winning Executive Chef, Nigel Harvey.

The auction line-up was a neat and tidy 36 lots. From each producer there was an en primeur* barrel (approx 25 cases), one of those ‘must-have’ lots from the cellar for the cellar, and the charity component of the auction consisted of an artist- designed imperial (6 litres) along with the accompanying piece of art. In some cases the original art was on the bottle itself.

Guests included locals, buyers from Perth and interstate, and also some international bidders courtesy of the internet. By the start of the auction, internet bids had ensured the reserve price on each of the 12 barrels had been reached, setting the scene for an interesting live auction. In the end, only one internet bid was successful, proving that you had to be there if you were serious about taking something home. The auction of the imperials raised over $30,000 for the Busselton Population Research Foundation, beneficiary of each GWE auction and established by the late Dr Kevin Cullen.

So, did the wines hold their own in terms of price? Caillard says, “I think the auction results were generally excellent and completely in line with the secondary market,” which is what he hoped the auction would achieve.

We West Australians have been described as parochial, thinking of ourselves as pretty smart wine producers. But when Australia’s pre-eminent wine auction house singles out Western Australia as the only state in the nation worthy of a classification of Great Wine Estates, who are we to argue?

*en primeur = where wine is sold before it is ‘finished’ and bottled.

Text by Alex Wright. Photography Clive Baker.