MAC FORBES
Yarra Valley, Victoria, Australia
Mac Forbes Wines represents the very best of cool-climate Yarra Valley winemaking. Driven by a relentless focus on terroir, Mac selects exceptional vineyard sites — many in the higher, cooler parts of the Upper Yarra — to craft wines that offer purity, tension, and unmistakable regional character.
For customers who value precision, freshness, and authenticity, these wines deliver in every bottle.
Mac’s philosophy is simple: let the vineyard tell its story. To achieve this, he works with sensitive farming, hand harvesting, gentle extraction, and minimal-intervention techniques. Oak is used sparingly and never dominates, allowing the wines to remain lifted, bright, and wonderfully detailed.
The range showcases what the Yarra Valley does best:
Pinot Noir with fine tannins, red-fruit purity, and elegant structure
Chardonnay that balances minerality with understated power
Riesling that is vibrant, aromatic, and beautifully precise
Select single-vineyard bottlings that highlight the unique personalities of sites like Woori Yallock, Hoddles Creek, and Gladysdale
For collectors and curious drinkers alike, Mac’s wines offer exceptional aging potential, high drinkability, and a consistent track record of critical acclaim. They are among the most expressive and site-faithful wines coming out of Australia today — a benchmark for modern Yarra Valley style.
Whether enjoyed young for their purity and energy or cellared to reveal deeper complexity, Mac Forbes Wines consistently reward those seeking wines with finesse, character, and a true sense of place.
This Yarra Valley Pinot Noir is known for capturing fruit expression with minimal intervention, blending grapes from various Yarra Valley vineyards like Coldstream and Yarra Junction, focusing on quality fruit picked ripe but crunchy, resulting in wines praised for elegance and value
Mac Forbes' "Hugh" Cabernets are elegant, fresh Bordeaux-style blends from Australia's Yarra Valley, dominated by Cabernet Sauvignon with Cabernet Franc, Merlot, and Petit Verdot, known for their vibrant red fruit, herbs, and silky tannins, offering both immediate enjoyment and aging potential, with lower alcohols for freshness. They're a signature wine, named for Mac's father, showcasing Yarra Valley's cool-climate strength
Mac Forbes Ferguson Chardonnay is a highly regarded, site-specific Chardonnay from the Ferguson Vineyard in Australia's Yarra Valley, known for its elegance, precision, and textural complexity, offering notes of citrus, stone fruit, herbs, and minerality, with minimal intervention winemaking (wild yeast, old oak, no fining) to capture the vineyard's character. It's a top-tier wine, often described as having "fine flesh on firm bones," with bright acidity and aging potential.
Spear Gully Chardonnay is a distinctive, elegant single-vineyard Chardonnay from the Upper Yarra Valley in Victoria, Australia, known for its bright acidity, mineral complexity (saline, oyster shell), citrus (lemon, lime) and stone fruit (peach) notes, often with subtle nutty or spicy hints, reflecting its unique volcanic soils and low alcohol, offering a style compared to Jura whites.
Mac Forbes "Little Yarra" Chardonnay is a highly-regarded, single-site Chardonnay from the cool, southern part of Australia's Yarra Valley, known for its complex profile of stone fruits, citrus (like preserved lemon, lime pith), honey, and flinty minerality, offering a rich yet balanced, age-worthy wine with a supple texture from its clay soils and minimal intervention winemaking.
Brilliant pale straw colour with a subtle tinge of green to the edges and a watery hue. Citrus, red apple and orange blossom scents drift from the glass with some honeysuckle like notes also evident. Lime and red apple fruits decorate the crunchy palate with infusions of orange blossom and slate lying underneath. Finishes dry with brisk acidity and a zingy aftertaste.
Mac Forbes EB17 Barossa Grenache (2023 vintage) is an Australian experimental (EB) Grenache from the Barossa Valley's Vine Vale, a collaboration with viticulturist Dylan Grigg from Vinya Vella, known for its bright red fruit (violets, blueberries), supple texture, silky tannins, and surprising lightness despite its 14% alcohol, reflecting the vineyard's characteristics with a fresh, energetic style.
Mac Forbes Little Yarra Pinot Noir is a single-vineyard wine from Gladysdale, Yarra Valley, known for its early ripening, rich aromatics, and supple structure from warm valley air and clay soils. It features vibrant red fruits, earthy notes (rhubarb, forest floor), spice, and firm tannins, made with whole bunches and old oak, offering bright energy with cellar potential for complexity.
Mac Forbes Ferguson Pinot Noir is a highly regarded, elegant, and light-bodied Pinot Noir from the Woori Yallock sub-region of the Yarra Valley, Australia, known for capturing site-specific character with notes of redcurrant, strawberry, cherry, and spice, balanced by fine tannins and low alcohol, making it a top-tier expression of Yarra Valley Pinot. The wine comes from a specific 1.36ha vineyard noted for its unique south-facing aspect, producing stunning fruit.
Fresh, aromatic and lifted Australian syrah from the cool-climate Yarra Valley. Nine months in small, used French oak barrels have rounded out the edges nicely. There is a little savoury, spicy wildness on the nose at first, but notes of rose petal, cranberry and blueberry shine bright on the medium-bodied and elegant palate.
Brilliant pale straw colour with a subtle tinge of green to the edges and a watery hue. Citrus, red apple and orange blossom scents drift from the glass with some honeysuckle like notes also evident. Lime and red apple fruits decorate the crunchy palate with infusions of orange blossom and slate lying underneath. Finishes dry with brisk acidity and a zingy aftertaste.
This is more on the lighter side of Pinot; herbal, incredibly aromatic and refreshing. It's just what you'd expect from a Mac Forbes Pinot - utterly moreish, richly aromatic and deliciously precise. Sitting at the southern end of the Yarra below Yarra Junction in the valley running north-south down to Gippsland.
Moody morello cherry and a little resinous funk open up to floral aromatics and an edge of orange rind. Vibrant red fruits on the front palate flow into a savoury core, with mealy structure drawing the finish down a lovely long line.
Brilliant pale straw colour with a subtle tinge of green to the edges and a watery hue. Citrus, red apple and orange blossom scents drift from the glass with some honeysuckle like notes also evident. Lime and red apple fruits decorate the crunchy palate with infusions of orange blossom and slate lying underneath. Finishes dry with brisk acidity and a zingy aftertaste.