Back to Beechworth: Chris Catlow's Sentiō

Beechworth-born Chris Catlow was barely a teenager when he started “mucking around” in vineyards. 

Later, after a formative vintage with Barry Morey at Sorrenberg, and armed with degrees in viticulture and wine science from La Trobe, Chris spent seven years on the Mornington Peninsula, at Paringa, Portsea Estate and, crucially, Kooyong and Port Phillip Estate, where he met Sandro Mosele. 

“Sandro exposed me to many aspects of the industry – he was a great person to learn from,” Chris says. “But what I learnt about most from him, philosophically, was single-site wines. The idea that each block can be different, that they should be looked at differently and treated differently… That was probably what captivated me the most to start my own brand.” 

Chris Catlow.

“He also introduced me to Burgundy, which I kind of hate him for,” he jokes. “It’s cost me a lot of money!” 

In 2013, in between the first of five vintages Chris would spend in Burgundy with Benjamin Laroux, while also helping James McLaurin at Golden Ball, and funding it all by working as a chippie and tiler for his mate’s building business, he made the first Sentiō wine – a shiraz. 

He counts the following year as the label’s first proper vintage, though. Back in Beechworth, in the winery he’d set up in an abandoned mental asylum, he produced three single-site chardonnays from Beechworth, Macedon Ranges and the Yarra Valley. The variety has been Sentiō’s most consistent offering ever since. 

Blue, the winery dog.

Variation in the range has largely been driven by availability. “I decided early on that I would build a winery and business before I’d plant a vineyard, and it’s been good, but it’s very hard if you're predominantly negociant, buying fruit, to get continuity in your wines,” Chris says. 

A shared lease on the Black Springs vineyard with Foreign Friends’ Leila Davis, as well as two brand new sites, planted predominantly to chardonnay with some sangiovese, too, is helping to consolidate his range, which presently includes pinot noir, nebbiolo, gamay and aligoté as well as chardonnay and shiraz. The goal is for Sentiō to be mostly Beechworth, except for the gamay and aligoté which will continue to come from King Valley. 

His philosophy is “neither maximum intervention nor minimum intervention,” but based on intuition, whatever will be “the most relaxed process to get the wine to a point we’re happy with,” he says. The wines are mostly basket-pressed and wild-fermented, and produced in a variety of vessels including stainless steel, clay, concrete, and oak in various formats and origin. “I value drinkability, but not at the expense of simplicity.”

Sentiō Gamay has been produced since 2019.

“It's a tricky one. It's hard to make a wine that everyone's going to enjoy, and yet someone who's really technical can see the detail.”

As the name suggests – Sentiō is a Latin verb which encompasses the act of feeling, experiencing, perceiving, or thinking – the ultimate goal is to produce expressive, balanced, site-driven wines. “It's what I value most,” Chris says.

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