WineNZ Summer 2019-20

Feature | First Lady of Wine
Hunter’s walkway 2016
After more
than 30 years
leading Hunter’s
Wines, Jane
Hunter is slowly
stepping back
from the family business, the
only one of the four earliest
Marlborough wineries still in the
same ownership. The younger
generation, nephews, James
and Edward Macdonald, are
taking more responsibility from
Jane and her brother, general
manager Peter Macdonald.l.
Although she’s at Hunter’s
most days and still does some
travelling to promote the wine,
she can now pick and choose
where she wants to go, she says.
It also means that when she
feels like it she can pop away to
Adelaide where she has a house.
She grew up in South Australia
where her parents were in the
wine industry and still has family
there.
An urn among the plantings - one of the delightful little surprises one does
across when walking round the garden.
The Hunter’s story has become
part of the New Zealand wine
legend - the ebullient Irishman
Ernie Hunter founding the winery
in 1979 and going on to win the
top award at the Sunday Times
Vintage Wine Show in the UK in
1986, then again in 1987, 1988,
1992 and 2001. It brought New
Zealand wine and sauvignon
34 WineNZ Magazine | Summer 2019/2020