New Puketapu winery scores a hit with Six60

The now four-piece Six60, are booked for Shed 530 Estate Winery at Puketapu on February 8. The band members are Ji Fraser (left), Matiu Walters, former Napier Boys' High School pupil Marlon Gerbes and Chris Mac. Photo / Supplied

A Puketapu winery that had just opened when it was devastated by Cyclone Gabrielle could host 10,000 Six60 fans when the Kiwi pop icons perform at the venue west of Napier on February 8.

Winemaker turned tractor driver Kel Dixon during a break while tending to a paddock that used to be a vineyard but which has emerged from the flooding and silt of Cyclone Gabrielle to become a venue for a Six60 concert. The show at Shed 530 Estate Winery, Puketapu in February is expected to attract about 10,000 fans. Photo / Doug Laing

Shed 530 Estate Winery, off Puketapu Rd and between Springfield and Vicarage Rds, opened just six weeks before the February 2023 cyclone and expects to formally reopen for customers early next month, although new vineyards are still in the making.

Delighted chief winemaker Kel Dixon said a paddock that had been a vineyard in growth had been restored from the silt, with the odd bit of chardonnay vine still popping up through the grass.

Now regrassed, elevated about 400mm and intended to be a concert venue with several shows a year, it will host Six60 in what will be the band’s third big outdoor concert at different venues in Hawke’s Bay.

Dixon said the group had expressed interest in such a concert with a Cyclone Gabrielle context, and the opportunity stemmed from conversation between group management and the Auckland-based winery owner.

The now four-piece Six60, from left Ji Fraser, Matiu Walters, former Napier Boys' High School pupil Marlon Gerbes, and Chris Mac. Photo / Supplied.

They were keen to be the first concert at the venue, and Dixon said: “We’ve had the management down here and they think it will be able to take 10,000.”

Crowds were estimated at about 20,000 for the group’s concerts at Tomoana Showgrounds, Hastings, in January 2021, and McLean Park, Napier, in November 2022.

At the time the five-piece band, formed among uni students in Dunedin in 2008, included former Napier Boys' High School students Eli Paewai and Marlon Gerbes.

Paewai retired earlier this year and, now a four-piece, Six60 will include the winery as the second stop on their eight-show Grassroots Australasian tour, announced on Monday.

The tour kicks off in Upper Hutt on February 1, and after the Hawke’s Bay gig the band head for concerts in Brisbane on February 22, Auckland’s Wynyard Quarter on March 1 and in Dunedin a week later, before crossing the Tasman again to perform in Melbourne, Sydney and Perth.

The weekend of the Saturday evening concert will be a big one in a big month for Hawke’s Bay, with motorbike stunts troupe Freestyle Kings at McLean Park the next day, and the annual Napier Art Deco Festival starting just four days later.