Queen's Birthday Honours: Honour a 'tribute to the Nobilo family'

Trailblazing wine maker Nick Nobilo has a passion for the industry. Photo / Dean Purcell

Nicholas Thomas Nobilo
Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to the wine industry

If each new vintage is like a newborn baby, then Nick Nobilo has a lot of children to keep track of.

The 71-year-old, who today is appointed an officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit, has 54 behind him after leaving school at 17 to join the family business.

That business was House of Nobilo, set up in 1944 by his father, Nikola Nobilo - a man credited with guiding New Zealand palates away from sherry and port to the delicate taste of table wine.

Winemaking, it seems, is in the blood - Nobilo's brothers Steve and Mark were also heavily involved in developing the business. Nick sees today's honour as a "tribute to the Nobilo family", which includes his mother, Zuva.

At 95 - and still enjoying two glasses of wine each night with dinner - she is the last surviving matriarch of New Zealand's old pioneering Dalmatian winemakers.

Although it was his parents who belonged to that pioneering generation, Nobilo can claim plenty of firsts of his own.

He produced New Zealand's first German-style Muller-Thurgau in 1974, which became the country's vin-du-pays, with the rest of the industry following in his wake.

He was the first winemaker to use new French oak for reds and introduced barrel fermentation for chardonnays. He developed New Zealand's first generic wine style for the export market in the 1980s.

He also pioneered the production of gewurztraminer in New Zealand and his Gisborne winery, Vinoptima, makes nothing else.

Nobilo says gewurztraminer is the perfect accompaniment for many meals.

"There is no other wine that matches so many types of cuisine," he says.

And despite his 54 vintages, Nobilo says that he has never tired of his life-long passion.

"Each new vintage to me is like a newborn baby. I love to watch and see how it develops just as anyone would their own children and each one captures the season," Nobilo says.

"I have a great passion for wine and a great passion for developing the industry ahead and I think New Zealand has a great potential with our diversity and our modern winemakers who are coming through ... we're in good stead."