Gourmet Traveller Wine magazine has awarded chief winemaker, Janice McDonald the Winemaker of the Year award for 2018.
The announcement was made at a gala dinner in Sydney last night in front of the country’s top winemakers, judges, critics and industry luminaries.
The win is also one for Western Australia: Janice McDonald was the only West Australian nominated, the first WA finalist since 2015 and the first WA winner since 2012.
McDonald said she was thrilled to take home the award,
“This is the most wonderful recognition of what we’ve achieved at Howard Park.
“I feel I stand here as the representative of an enormous number of people who have such an important part to play – from the winemakers to the grapegrowers to the marketers to the people that sell the wine. Really the whole group of staff.”
McDonald has been chief winemaker at Howard Park since 2011, overseeing multiple wine brands across four vineyards in two of Australia’s premier wine growing regions – Margaret River and the Great Southern.
She has worked closely with Howard Park’s owners, the Burch Family, for seven years, and through her career has taken out Best Australian Sparkling Wine at the Champagne and Sparkling Wine World Championships last year; was nominated previously for GT’s Winemaker of the Year in 2013; and was crowned Best Winemaker in the 2010 – 2011 edition of The Big Red Wine Book by Campbell Mattinson and Gary Walsh.
The Burch family congratulated McDonald on her achievement.
“For someone with such a career, we are just so honoured to have Janice working with us and believe this award really is testament to the esteem she is held in within the industry and among her peers,” said marketing director Amy Burch.
“It is a huge validation of the work she has done not only in her years as a winemaker, but specifically at Howard Park.
“From taking on two quite different wine regions, spearheading our sparkling wine program, running a team of staff around the clock during prolonged vintages — she is tireless. We could not be prouder, and look forward to what she has in store for us in the future.”
Janice had this to say upon hearing the news of her nomination earlier this year: “It is an honour, of course. When I think about it in the context of working at Howard Park, we make a big range of wine from various regions, different labels and at different prices.
“It’s not all about winning stacks of trophies for one or two top wines, though we do see awards across the range. I’ve tried to bring that consistency in quality.
“To me, this nomination is recognition of our work in trying to attain that consistency.”
Gourmet Traveller Wine Magazine’s Winemaker of the Year Award celebrates its 21st year in 2018.
It described the accolade as “celebrating the most talented winemakers in the land.”
The judging panel consists of well-known Australian wine industry names, including Peter Forrestal and Huon Hooke.
