How Tasmania’s east coast wine region is taking on the world
It’s one of the smallest wine regions in Australia, but the people running the show have big plans for this picturesque spot.
Tasmania’s east coast is one of the smallest wine regions in Australia – but the people running the show have big plans for their pocket of the world.
Devil’s Corner, one of Tasmania’s most famous wineries, is one of those dreamers, recently banking big on the region with a multimillion-dollar expansion of its cellar door.
Back in 2010, the winery was taken over by Aussie winemaking giant Brown Brothers, and has gone from strength to strength since.
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But the people behind the brand are the first to admit they didn’t realise how much demand there would be in the beginning.
The winery’s cellar door started in a humble shipping container, perched on a hill just off the side of the road, after the company estimated there would be only a few thousand visitors a year.
Instead, more than 20,000 people came in their first year, a number that jumped to 35,000 a year later.
In 2015, they opened their permanent cellar door, with a view that showcases the vineyard’s stunning location in the Freycinet Peninsula.
With the upgraded cellar door, the winery quickly saw visitor numbers increase to around 100,000 each year, helped also by the fact it is on one of the state’s most popular and picturesque tourist drives.
Pre-Covid, when travel wasn’t impeded by a global pandemic or border closures, the east coast of Tasmania was welcoming more than 300,000 people each year.
The sheer number of visitors to the east coast winery left Devil’s Corner feeling comfortable over its sweeping makeover of the venue.
Not just a place to drink wine
Devil’s Corner has expanded to offer a host of experiences for visitors.
The new Hazards Tasting Room, named after the imposing mountain range in Freycinet National Park, opened last month, as did the Devil’s Den, an inviting underground cellar that welcomes visitors for wine and food masterclasses and private events.
The upgraded venue has been expertly carved into the hill, its award-winning architecture accented with the timber and concrete which Tasmanian design has become so well-known for.
Pizzas are wood-fired in the onsite oven, and the thousands of oysters they sell each week are from a farm just a stone’s throw away – so close it can be seen from the venue.
With Tasmania’s wild seasons famous across Australia and another chilly winter on the horizon, Devil’s Corner marketing manager Will Adkins said the expansion has meant the winery could welcome people year-round, without having to battle the elements.
“Through calm autumns, wild winters and warm summers, we have no control over the weather,” he said.
“But with the new site expansion, we can ensure visitors will experience the very best of Devil’s Corner no matter the season.
“The new site is more than double its original size with new and improved shelter and more casual spaces to be enjoyed by the increasing number of consumers visiting the cellar door each year.”
More plans on horizon for winery
But even with Devil’s Corner now being a well-oiled, wildly popular machine, the team still has big dreams.
The group is working on restoring its original storage container, the one that introduced Devil’s Corner to so many tourists more than a decade ago, and turning it into an oyster and tasting bar.
Visitors will be able to book out the shipping container for private parties or tastings. They will be driven down to the lagoon, through the grapevines, and eventually to the container where they can eat endless fresh oysters washed down with Devil’s Corner wine.
The team also has big plans for getting even more people to the winery.
Located halfway between Launceston and Hobart, while the winery isn’t in the middle of nowhere, it can make overindulgence difficult for guests, with someone always having to be the designated driver.
So the Devil’s Corner team is working on building a transport network along the east coast that won’t just take visitors to their winery but will showcase everything the region has to offer.
Talking to news.com.au, they reinforced the importance of supporting the entire region, with hopes of turning it into something similar to South Australia’s Barossa region or NSW’s Hunter Valley.
Sustainability is also of huge importance, with the thousands of empty oyster shells left from visitors being ground up and repurposed in farming and even for the cellar door’s paths.
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Even the wine barrels are given a second life, with Devil’s Corner breaking them up and using them as tasting paddles.
The cellar door at Devil’s Corner, in Apslawn, Tasmania, is open seven days a week, from 10am to 5pm.
This journalist was a guest of Devil’s Corner Winery
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