Cellar Door Conversations: Cynthea

Endless Learning;
Constant Connection

It’s been a long and varied journey for Cynthea Semmens, co-owner and winemaker at Marion’s Vineyard. Growing up in the USA, and then later moving back to her family’s vineyard, she has travelled in between and worked in wine regions all over the world in a variety of capacities – from winemaker and cellar hand to marketer, photographer, and journalist.

“Originally, I thought winemaking seemed a ‘bit dirty’; marketing seemed much more my thing,” Semmens laughs. “But, after university, I moved to the Napa Valley in California for five years. I did a few vintages as a cellarhand and soon realised ‘Oh, I think I actually want to be a winemaker’. Getting my hands dirty, it turns out, was actually pretty fun!”

It’s a journey of endless learning. To Semmens, there is always more to learn about the practice and culture of winemaking. There is always deeper knowledge to be gained. From her initial marketing related studies at Roseworthy in South Australia, to later going back to gain her winemaking degree, she’s never really stopped looking for answers, even taking up courses in philosophy early in her career. Most recently, she’s been diving into soil science.

“It’s always just been about using all the different bits I can learn from different things and trying to get them to fit together and make sense,” she says. “I’ve done a couple of online soil classes this year. I’ve also taken some permaculture classes. I’m heavily into regenerative agriculture podcasts, too. There isn’t much about wine, specifically – but lots of things can be applied to what we do.”

However, Semmens is not driven so much by ideas of competitive edge. Rather, by ideas of connection. Perhaps unsurprisingly for someone who has grown up in the very vineyard she helps run today, she views all her knowledge-gathering as a necessary path to better understanding and connecting with the land of her home and family.

“Honestly, this property is probably the best part of my job,” she says. “It has it’s own heartbeat. It’s like another family member. I’m absolutely in love with it. And, over the years, I’ve just loved seeing so many other people fall in love with it, too. Our visitors, our friends, our family. These days, I’m not so much focused on the minutiae of winemaking as much as what I can do in the vineyard to nurture and develop that amazing quality in our grapes.”

“When I worked in all these old world wine regions, where they’ve been making wine for hundreds of years, I really had my eyes opened. In the new world wine regions, like Australia, there’s often a focus on innovation and technology. But, in those older regions, it’s more about what you can do for the land. Learning to leave it alone, you know, rather than endlessly mess with it and then likely have to fix it at the end, anyway.”

“For all the studying I’ve done over the years,” she says, thoughtfully. “I probably should have started with viticulture. That’s what I’m most passionate about now. That deep connection with the land itself.”

Want to try Marion’s Vineyard wines? See what we have on offer here.