Blind Corner
Organics, Biodynamics, making wine with no additives…
Ben Gould has good taste. After his father sold the family’s Deep Woods vineyard in Yallingup in 2005, Gould and wife Naomi put everything on red, choosing to sell their house to fund the purchase of a small 4 hectare vineyard at Wilyabrup. While their new patch of dirt was being weaned off irrigation and chemicals, the pair took off to Europe. Before leaving Marg, Gould had already developed a strong interest in organic viticulture, a passion that became armour-plated after visiting some of Europe’s more storied regions.
Upon his return, Gould took a job at Howard Park Wines while he bootstrapped his fledgling estate together, doing much of the work himself, begging and borrowing what he could and fixing up old, dilapidated equipment that would have been impossible for him to buy new. The first years at Blind Corner proved to be a trial by fire, with Gould not only having to work two jobs but also working leased parcels to supplement his own small yields.
Come 2015; tired of seeing vineyards owned by others but that he had been working organically himself, sold from under him, the Goulds took the plunge on an established 20 hectare vineyard 19 km to the northeast, at Quindalup. Surrounded on three sides by the ocean, Gould wasted no time in converting the previously conventional viticulture to organic and biodynamic, while also grafting over portions of established rootstock to varieties such as Aligoté (a Marg first) and a Brunello clone of Sangiovese and Pinot Grigio. In 2016 the Wilyabrup vineyard was certified organic and biodynamic, followed by Quindalup in 2017, and, lastly, in early 2018 Blind Corner’s Yallingup vineyard joined the ranks. BIBENDUM
Ben Gould has good taste. After his father sold the family’s Deep Woods vineyard in Yallingup in 2005, Gould and wife Naomi put everything on red, choosing to sell their house to fund the purchase of a small 4 hectare vineyard at Wilyabrup. While their new patch of dirt was being weaned off irrigation and chemicals, the pair took off to Europe. Before leaving Marg, Gould had already developed a strong interest in organic viticulture, a passion that became armour-plated after visiting some of Europe’s more storied regions.
Upon his return, Gould took a job at Howard Park Wines while he bootstrapped his fledgling estate together, doing much of the work himself, begging and borrowing what he could and fixing up old, dilapidated equipment that would have been impossible for him to buy new. The first years at Blind Corner proved to be a trial by fire, with Gould not only having to work two jobs but also working leased parcels to supplement his own small yields.
Come 2015; tired of seeing vineyards owned by others but that he had been working organically himself, sold from under him, the Goulds took the plunge on an established 20 hectare vineyard 19 km to the northeast, at Quindalup. Surrounded on three sides by the ocean, Gould wasted no time in converting the previously conventional viticulture to organic and biodynamic, while also grafting over portions of established rootstock to varieties such as Aligoté (a Marg first) and a Brunello clone of Sangiovese and Pinot Grigio. In 2016 the Wilyabrup vineyard was certified organic and biodynamic, followed by Quindalup in 2017, and, lastly, in early 2018 Blind Corner’s Yallingup vineyard joined the ranks. BIBENDUM