A Q&A with our Winemaker Mason Spink

A: I come from corporate winemaking, where we spent a lot of time worrying about budgets and yields and things like that. On Dirty Laundry’s side, they had been using a consultant winemaker for years, but were getting to the size where they needed a full time maker on the team. The chance to work with a growing winery—this year we’re up to 34,000 cases being produced—is a kind of dream come true. There’s room to experiment and try new varietals all the time. 

A: My personal favourite is the Kay’s Syrah. It’s unique in that it’s a leaner style, less jammy fruit. We co-ferment it with some Viognier skins. That does a couple of things: It adds mid-palate structure, and it also adds a bit more complexity to the wine.

A: The Hush Rosé. It’s our biggest-selling wine, and it’s also the hardest and most time-consuming to make. We do double the work for half the yield on this wine. After we do two press cycles a day per type of grape, we let the Pinot Gris grapes soak for 24 hours to pull some delicate colour from the skins. Our production times slow way down, but this wine is worth the time investment for sure.