Sinclair's Gully — forest weddings, sparkling wine, Norton Summit

Sep to Nov

Wildflowers

Guided wine and wildflower walks through the sanctuary while it is in flower.

Dec to Feb

Twilight

Black cockatoos come through the candlebark at dusk. Picnics welcome on the deck.

Mar to May

Vintage

Hand disgorged in small batches on site.

Jun to Aug

Closed

The cellar door closes. You can still call ahead and pick up wine any day of the week.

Weddings and elopements

Small, and in the trees

Ceremonies in the forest clearing, elopements for two under the gums, and micro weddings for the people who actually matter. Held on a working vineyard rather than in a function room.

Sean makes every bottle of sparkling by hand, in small batches, on site.

Weddings at Sinclair’s Gully · their own film

The deck

The walk down

Elopement

2 hours · up to 10 people · Sunday to Friday

What is included ▾

2 hours venue hire between 10am and 8pm
Choice of forest setting, undercover patio, deck, lawned area or sparkling room
Signing barrel and up to 10 chairs for guests
Access to onsite toilets, power and water

Wedding ceremony

3 hours · up to 100 guests · Sunday to Friday

What is included ▾

Exclusive use of the venue: forest setting, undercover patio, deck and lawned area
Up to 3 hours between 9am and 8pm, starting 30 minutes before the ceremony
Signing barrel and up to 16 chairs for guests
Access to onsite toilets, power and water

Mid week micro wedding

4 hours · up to 50 guests · Monday to Thursday

What is included ▾

Ceremony and reception, exclusive use of the venue
16 ceremony chairs, signing table and 2 chairs, or a signing wine barrel
3 onsite toilets, access to power and water

Micro wedding

5 hours · up to 60 guests · seven days

What is included ▾

Ceremony and reception across the forest setting, cellar door, undercover patio, deck and lawn
Up to 5 hours between 10am and 9pm, starting 30 minutes before the ceremony
Access on the day to set up and pack down between 8am and 10pm
16 ceremony chairs, signing table and 2 chairs, or a signing wine barrel

Forest wedding and reception

6 hours · up to 100 guests · seven days

What is included ▾

Ceremony and reception across the forest setting, cellar door, undercover patio, deck and lawn
Up to 6 hours between 9am and 10pm, starting 30 minutes before the ceremony
Access on the day to set up and pack down between 8am and 10pm
3 onsite toilets, access to power and water

Venue hire starts thirty minutes before the ceremony. A celebrant and photography package can be added: $1,200 on the elopement, $1,400 on the others, with celebrants from $600 and photography from $800. Wine barrels, arbor, tables, chairs, umbrellas, 100m of festoon lighting, a PA, an urn and a 6 by 6 marquee are available to hire.

Fizzology · $95 a person

Make the bottle, then take it home

An afternoon in the sparkling house with Sean, who is the winemaker, the owner and the bloke who planted the vines. You handle real wine at every stage and leave with a bottle you disgorged yourself.

Sean, mid-explanation

01 Discover the history of handcrafted méthode traditionnelle sparkling
02 Create your own bottle using the old world techniques of hand disgorging, dosaging and corking
03 Take home your personalised bottle, and the knowledge that came with it
04 Along the way Sean shares the biodynamic vineyard ethos and the conservation work behind it

Private sessions run for your own group, minimum four people.

The press

And then you drink it

Live music and events

Most of what happens here has a ticket

Concerts under the candlebark, a wildflower wander through the sanctuary, carols in December. The venue opens thirty minutes before each start so you can get a picnic out.

Performances go ahead rain or shine, and a marquee goes up if it looks like rain.

An afternoon of live music under the gums

A Sunday afternoon

Under the gums

Sun 6 · 1pm

Fathers Day picnics and music

Hannah Margaret

$15

Fri 26 · 6pm

Fiddles in the Forest

The Fiddle Chicks

$20

Sat 27 · 2pm

Jazz under the Gums

Courteney Hooper

$20

Tue 29 · 11am

Wine and Wildflower Wander

Through the sanctuary with Sean

$20

Fri 2 & Sun 4 · 11am

Sparkling in the Wild

Make your own bottle with Sean

$95

Sat 3 · 2pm

Forest Dreaming

Glenn Skuthorpe

$20

Mon 5 · 2pm

A Celtic Story

Siobhan Owen, singer and harpist

$20

Sun 21 · 7pm

Carols under the gums

Arrive from 6pm, bring a picnic

Free

Tickets are paid for when you book. Bring a picnic and your own glasses, or buy one for $5. Sinclair’s Gully wine, sparkling and beer are sold by the glass or bottle, and there is strictly no BYO alcohol.

The sanctuary

The vineyard is the smaller half

Most of this property is not planted to vines and never will be. Twenty acres of it is a gazetted nature sanctuary holding a critically endangered candlebark forest, which carries the highest conservation rating in the Mount Lofty Ranges.

Twenty-seven years of bush care went into that, and part of what the wine makes goes back into it. Sue and Sean have been here since 1999.

Sue and Sean Delaney

Black cockatoo, on the property

150

Native plants

Many of them rare or endangered, and in flower from September.

Bird species

Including the black cockatoos that come through the candlebark at dusk.

Of us, nationally

Cellar doors holding advanced eco certification with Ecotourism Australia.

Acres, gazetted

A nature sanctuary, not a paddock waiting to be planted.

The wines

Ten wines, and seven of them are Grenache

Sean hand disgorges every bottle of sparkling in small batches on site, which almost nobody at this scale still does. Alongside them, reds, whites, a rosé and a fortified.

Three are between vintages rather than gone. Leave an address and we will write the week they are back.