Exploring Winemaking: The Tinkerer Philosophy

November 13, 2025

When curiosity becomes flavour

Swirl your glass. If your sample has weight, texture, maybe a slightly savoury twist, you are drinking something from The Tinkerer’s workshop.

This style is about leaning in. Shaping. Exploring. Taking the raw fruit and asking what else it can become with time, texture and patience.

How a Tinkerer winemaker thinks

If you were a Tinkerer today, your thought process would wander like this:

Start with a question, not a plan
Could this have more texture. More depth. More richness. What happens if I push this just a bit further.

Choose your vessel with intention
Stainless if you want clarity.
Old oak if you want warmth.
Concrete if you want quiet vibrational energy.

Use lees like seasoning
You would leave the wine sitting on its lees because lees are flavour. Brioche. Softness. A gentle savoury whisper.

Play with skin contact
Sometimes you let the skins stay a bit longer. Sometimes they leave quickly. You decide by smelling, tasting and trusting your instincts.

Age it slowly
Tinkerer wines always spend time resting. Time builds layers. Time adds stories. Time softens edges.

The global Tinkerer

You find these winemakers everywhere.

In Burgundy where lees ageing adds richness to Chardonnay
In Rioja where barrel aged whites smell like warm beeswax
In South Africa where Chenin gives buttery depth when left alone with old oak
In Friuli where long elevage whites have become a quiet religion

They are the winemakers who always ask what else the wine could become.

What Jose does at Vagabond

Dios Mio is the purest example of Jose’s tinkering.
Wild fermented. Half on skins for 11 days, half whole bunch pressed and dropped straight into old Burgundy oak. Nine months ageing. Unfiltered. Unfined.
The result is a wine that feels sculpted but not overworked.