Local Adelaide artist Sarah McDonald has had her original artwork featured on the label on Serafino’s new orange wine, the first of its kind to come from the winery.

The McLaren Vale winery has collaborated with McDonald, who is renowned for her landscape paintings, to bring a sense of place to the wine, in hopes it better represents the wine’s regionality with McDonald’s interpretation of iconic Aldinga Beach.

In addition to the label featuring her artwork, McDonald was also involved in the naming of the wine, dubbing it as the Serafino Orenji Project McLaren Vale White Blend – ‘Orenji’ meaning ‘orange’ in Japanese.

“The Aldinga coastline is one of the most beautiful coastlines in the county and right next door to the McLaren Vale wine region, which is one of the reasons I chose it as my subject matter,” McDonald said, “he cliffs that glow orange at certain times of the day combined with the stunning blue ocean makes it appropriate for the new, fresh orange wine too”.

Serafino approached McDonald for the collaboration because this is the first time the family-owned winery has made an orange wine, and “an intricate piece of artwork seemed like the perfect way to express the creativity of the wine”.

“Throughout the process, we both realised how many similarities there are between creating art and making wine. They are both about composition, structure, balance, colour and a sensory experience,” said Maria Maglieri, CEO of Serafino.

Winemaker Charles Whish, a 2002 Jimmy Watson trophy winner, decided to make an orange wine after learning it was high in demand.

He says that many wine consumers these days are on the hunt for lower alcohol, preservative free and generally unique wine offerings, and that The Orenji Project is Serafino’s answer to that demand.

“The Orenji Project is a preservative free white wine that uses fermentation on skins, carbonic maceration and wild yeast fermentation to create a wine that expresses the character of the varieties,” he said, “the challenge is to make the wine with broad consumer appeal and enjoyment with repeat sales”.

“We had the wine buying team from Dan Murphy’s visiting us in January, and we asked what they were drinking and what customers were drinking, and they said orange wine. This is what inspired us to create one,” added Whish.

Agreeing with Whish, Mark Samaha, assistant fine wine category manager SA at Dan Murphy’s said, “This ‘new wave’ of wines which includes natural, orange and minimal intervention wines is high in demand in Australia, which is incredibly exciting and we see lots of colour, personality and creativity expressed”.

Maglieri said the challenge to make what Whish describes as “Australia’s most drinkable” orange wine was the way to go.

“Many orange wines on the market can taste a bit funky, but our winemaker Charles is incredibly creative and scientific – orange wine is made with grape juice handled oxidatively, so there’s a lot of finesse to it. We think he has fulfilled his own challenge, and created a delicious orange wine,” she said.

The wine is a blend of Gewūrztraminer, Pinot Grigio and White Frontignac, is orange in hue and slightly cloudy in texture.

McDonald says the original painting for the Orenji Project now hangs in the Serafino cellar door in McLaren Vale.

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