Coming soon: a natural taste of the Hills hits the CBD
Wine Flowers, a cellar door, retail space and florist, is about to open on Pirie Street, bringing a wine experience to metro Adelaide that is “rougher on the edges”.
Walking into Wine Flowers on Pirie Street, I find a relaxed Sophie Button sitting on stools by a freshly painted half wine barrel, reading the latest CityMag – she says she was just doing her homework.
The rest of the gang trod in one by one. Amber Ochota lugging a heavy old table, Mark Warner carrying boxes of wine while he waits for Alicia Basa to, stressfully, find a city car park with more than a half an hour limit – something they’re not used to.
When we begin to chat about their latest CBD venture, Sophie tells me they were going for a relaxed Hills vibe because that’s where the team live.
“We didn’t have a business plan so I can’t imagine we’ll have a design plan,” Mark laughs.
“Well, the idea is this is not about new things. This is not about buying things. This is like, bring what you have that we can use, and we make it work,” Sophie says as a spider crawls off the table that Amber just brought to the venue.
“It’s nice. It’s different. It’s unusual. I just painted these [half wine barrels] yesterday.”
The Wine Flowers team is, nearly, ready to open up
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The Renew Adelaide space aims to bring the Hills cellar door experience to the Adelaide CBD.
Every week until the end of the year, a new natural winery from the Hills will take up a week’s residency at the venue, but Commune of Buttons, which is co-owned by Sophie and her brother Jasper Button, will be pouring the whole way through to Christmas time.
The first week will highlight the winery Borachio, which is co-owned by Alicia and Mark. The second week will see Ochota Barrels, which Amber owns and the last week will see Basket Range Wine, which Phil, Mary and Sholto Broderick own.
“We do open cellar doors at our property at Commune of Buttons and we do them twice a year and I just thought that even though we do them only twice a year, it’s hard to get up there for some people,” Sophie says.
“There’s like the access to our wines, to our presence, to our individual personalities, our place – all those things don’t come to the city very often.
“And I just thought it was a really cool thing to bring the producers and a cellar door style to the city that is a little rougher on the edges, a little more exciting.”
Sophie says this venture is “about conversations” which is “what you do when you drink wine”.
“It’s just about…understanding what we do and why we do it,” Sophie says.
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“I suppose, in some ways, moving away from the idea of what natural wine is – clarifying, helping through conversation, because there’s a lot more that goes into making wine and farming than a really simple conversation.”
There will be bottles from Commune of Buttons, Borachio, Ochota Barrels and Basket Range Wine on offer at Wine Flowers over the December period.
Along with the cellar door-like experience, there will be a small section of the shop dedicated to a retail space: sustainable retailer Ensemble Studios will have a range of products for purchase, while Emma Sadie Thomson of EST will also be selling plants and flowers.
“I think that was the Christmas buzz,” Sophie says.
“The idea was that you would have a Christmas party that you had to go to and so you would go and get some wines and flowers as well and always be supporting artisans.
“We’re artisans, and so we like to support other artisans who are doing similar things with their craft.
“Ensemble has always done that. They’ve always made sure that the people they’re supporting are doing things sustainably and properly and thoughtfully and consciously… Ensemble just made sense.”
As for Emma Sadie Tomson’s inclusion, Sophie says “it’s a pretty beautiful time of year for blooms”, so the team wanted to bring that into the city.
“Literally looking around at the property… and the time of year and the feeling is bright and colourful, and summer’s coming, and the energy is big,” Sophie says.
“I really felt like it’s quite a natural combination – maybe it is because we’re always surrounded by flowers and wine.
“Bringing that idea and then those lovely, normalities for us is a really nice way to present what it is that we do. It’s always more than wine.”
Wine Flowers will be closed over January as “no one’s in the city”, but Sophie says the concept will change in February, though she doesn’t know exactly what that will look like.
Wine Flowers is located at Shop 6, 189–211 Pirie Street, Adelaide and is slated to open on December 4.