Meet Angus Vinden, a Hunter Valley winemaker who’s blending grapes with creativity, tradition with irreverence, and winemaking with… self-portraits?
Vinden’s wine labels feature a photograph of him, taken every year, showing the toll, the triumph, or whatever the season had to throw at him. The result? A label that’s as much a snapshot of his life as it is a preview of what’s in the bottle.
The story of Vinden’s photography project starts in 2020, when lockdown brought him a rare pause. “It was the first time in five years that I was forced to really slow down,” he recalls. Until then, he’d been in full-speed-ahead mode, and establishing his winery.
During the lockdown, Vinden rediscovered an old love—photography. “There was a time, before I was a full-time vigneron when I never went anywhere without a camera slung over my shoulder,” he says.
With unexpected time on his hands, he picked up his camera and started experimenting again, creating self-portraits that captured his mood, his energy, and—eventually—the yearly rhythm of his winemaking life.
“The bigger the bags under my eyes, the tougher the vintage,” he jokes. In the long run, he hopes these photos will become a timeline of his life as a winemaker, capturing the effects of time on both him and his craft.
Not everyone sees it in such a poetic light, though. “Some of my friends in the wine industry call it the ‘vanity range’,” he explains. “And yeah, that’s fair.” But for Vinden, it’s actually about stripping down the ego—showing himself as a regular guy and a farmer, not some elusive “rockstar” winemaker.
“Over time, this will be less of a ‘look at me’ and more of a look at the winemaking journey.”
The wines under his Headcase label are a little different from the rest of the Vinden Wines lineup. These wines are his playground, featuring experimental grape varieties and a more progressive approach to winemaking.
“I don’t want it to become some gimmick. For me, it’s about subtle changes, nothing contrived.”
Think Gamay, Chenin Blanc, or Alicante Bouschet—grapes not exactly common in the Hunter Valley. By choosing these less traditional varieties, he’s putting a new spin on Australia’s oldest winegrowing region and giving wine lovers a taste of something unexpected.
“The impressionist labels are usually the more alternative wines, the ones breaking the mould a bit,” Vinden explains.
And the “Headcase” name? That’s a nod to Vinden’s family and, in his words, to the “bit of madness” that comes with farming. “I think anyone who farms has to be at least a little crazy.”
His family’s vineyard, originally planted by his parents, was something of a leap of faith. “It’s a not-so-subtle nod to them, and the decision they made to plant a vineyard with zero prior experience.
“Farming can be brutal or amazing, and you never know what you’re going to get.”
Over the years, Vinden’s learned to appreciate the unpredictability of farming, even if it means bushfires, floods, or hailstorms—sometimes all in a single year. “In the last six years, we’ve had it all,” he says. “The last ‘normal’ vintage we had was 2018.”
Still, he believes in balancing tradition with a willingness to innovate. “Tradition isn’t stagnant; it’s always evolving,” he says, adding that his role is to honour the Hunter Valley’s roots while nudging the region forward.
For Vinden, this means reinterpreting traditional styles through a modern lens, challenging the status quo, and producing wines that reflect his values—especially in his commitment to organic, regenerative farming.
“All wine represents a place,” he reflects, “and I want my wines to speak for the land we’re farming.”
Vinden’s portraits are carefully crafted to reflect that season’s journey. He sticks to the same expression each year, letting the small details—crow’s feet, a few more grey hairs, the inevitable bags under his eyes—tell the story.
“I don’t want it to become some gimmick. For me, it’s about subtle changes, nothing contrived.”
And for anyone curious about what’s inside a bottle of Headcase, Vinden’s designed the experience to be anything but ordinary. “There’s only a photo on the front label,” he says. “If you want to know what the wine is, you have to pick it up, and turn it around.”
For Vinden, that small act of engagement—of disrupting the usual routine—is what he’s after. It’s a moment for the buyer to connect with the story, the wine, and the person behind it all.
