Gisborne, near the eastern tip of the North Island, is not an area of New Zealand many tourists get to see, mainly because it’s so remote. It does reward visitors though, with great surf beaches, ocean fishing and New Zealand’s most famous Chardonnay and Gewürztraminer.

Brancott provided a major impetus to the local wine industry in the 1970s and continues to be a vital part of the industry in the region.

Our Winery inherited the mantle of one of the region’s oldest wineries, Friedrich Wohnsiedler’s Waihirere Winery, which was founded in 1921. In the 1970s, Brancott bought the virtually defunct winery and set about reinventing the Gisborne wine industry. The current winery is actually a combination of three adjacent wineries that had amalgamated over the years.