Oria-Riff

Aussie-born but Canadian-raised winemaker Cooper Davis-Draper was visiting some mates in the Barossa during vintage ’22 when he 'accidentally' made a few barrels of wine. He called his new label Oria-Riff – the first word Italian for ‘golden’ or ‘rising sun’, the second a reference to the Rif Mountains in Morocco where the seed for this project was first planted – and did one more harvest in the region before chasing the surf to McLaren Vale. Old-vine semillon and grenache is sourced from famed organic grower Fiona Wood, and in ’25, he took out a lease on 1.2ha of chardonnay and grenache near Blewitt Springs that he farms himself. The range is intentionally small and fluid, the final wines dictated by the season but bound by transparency of site, minerality and texture. This is a label to watch. -ANNA WEBSTER