Our Story.
A family owned enterprise. Thomas and Jean planted the vineyard on September 11, 2001, opening the Cellar Door in September 2013.
They were the Hunter’s ‘accidental vignerons’, a Sydney couple who made a spur-of-the-moment decision to buy a block of land in Pokolbin and grow their own vines. But more than two decades later, the award-winning single vineyard varieties on offer from Jean and Thomas Degen’s family-run vineyard and cellar door are firm favourites among wine connoisseurs, while their luxury, larger group accommodation attracts five-star reviews from guests blown away by what’s on offer across the picturesque 54-acre property.
DEGEN (pronounced D-EE-GEN) our surname and is German in origin, meaning fencing sabre or sword and is depicted across our branding by an antique block print of a man in lunge position, fencing with his sabre. The lunge position is a “balanced” position, highlighting our philosophy of balance in vineyard management to produce well balanced premium quality grapes for fine wine.
As the smallest commercial vineyard in the Lower Hunter, the DEGEN’s grow Shiraz, Chardonnay and Semillon and produce single vineyard wine in collaboration with leading Hunter Valley winemakers.
“Everything we do is on a small scale. We want to be great at being small”, Tom & Jean Degen
