The 2026 Liquid Luxury Wine Show
The fifth Liquid Luxury Wine Show has wrapped up, and five years in, the wines coming out of home barrels around the country are a long way from where this started in 2022.
Ninety-one wines came across our tasting bench this year. Every one of them is a barrel that someone has been topping up, tasting and quietly fussing over for the past twelve months. Our winemaking team judged the lot blind, by class, across three days on the 7th, 8th and 9th of September and it remains one of our favourite weeks on the calendar.
Blind judging by class takes time. Every wine was tasted against its own peers, scored independently by each judge, then discussed before a final score was agreed.
Balance was again the thing that separated the top wines. Concentration is not a fault in itself, and some of the finest wines in the show were deeply concentrated. What the golds had in common was the right ratio of fresh to aged material, each lifting the other rather than pulling against it. The judges flagged wines in both directions this year. Some carried more young fruit than a wine of that age should, with the old and the young clashing in the glass. Others were concentrated to the point where the sugar had buried everything underneath it. SO2 came up often enough to be worth mentioning too, usually where a barrel needed freshening. If you are not sure where yours sits on any of that, it is exactly what our free barrel analysis is for.
Judging and scoring
Entries were assessed blind, by class, using the Australian wine show 100 point system:
95 to 100: Gold, exceptional
90 to 94: Silver, outstanding
85 to 89: Bronze, commendable
80 to 84: Solid, good effort with minor imperfections
75 to 79: Mediocre, drinkable but lacking finesse
50 to 74: Not recommended
This year's results came in at 19 gold, 39 silver and 25 bronzes.
A note on classes. Where the judges felt a wine sat better in a different class than the one it was entered in, they moved it and judged it there. Seventeen wines shifted this year, and in one case the move made the difference between a placing and a class win. If your class looks different to what you entered, that is why, and the reasoning is in your judging notes.
🏆 Best in Show
Darren Read
Score: 97/100 | Category: Topaque | Class: Dark, Decadent & Aged
The judges called it a beast of a wine. Burnt sugar, savoury fish sauce, chocolate and rancio, rich and decadent but still balanced, finishing on black licorice. A lot of sugar, with the power and complexity to back it up. A lovely nose, a luscious palate and a beautiful finish.
This is Darren's second Best in Show. He took it in 2024 with a Muscat, and has now done it with a Topaque, which are two quite different wines to get right. He also won the Muscat category in 2025. That is not luck, it is someone who pays close attention to his barrels and keeps at it.
Darren takes home a ten litre limited edition barrel, handcrafted from fifty-year-old ex Stanton & Killeen fortified oak. These barrels were originally sourced by Norman Killeen in the 1960s and 70s from old bourbon and whisky casks. After decades holding S&K fortifieds, they are getting a second life, which feels about right for a show built on people giving old traditions a new go at home. A Best in Show sash goes with it.
Category 1: Muscat (47 entries)
Category Winner: Peter Price, 96/100 (Class 1) 🏆
Balanced, with a lovely nose and real length. All the right things in all the right places, and the best put together Muscat in the show.
Class 1 Winner: Peter Price, 96/100 Gold
Class 2 Winner: George Dalidakis, 96/100 Gold
Class 3 Winner: Brian Sargent, 96/100 Gold
Gold Medals: Carl Moore, Darren Read, Gary Henry, Michael Flegeltaub
Category 2: Topaque (18 entries)
Category Winner and Best in Show: Darren Read, 97/100 (Class 3) 🏆
Class 1 Winner: Stanley Gyles, 95/100 Gold
Class 2 Winner: Tina Perfrement, 96/100 Gold
Class 3 Winner: Darren Read, 97/100 Trophy
Gold Medals: Phillip Sloper, Steve Sparkes
Worth noting that Stanley Gyles entered his Class 1 winner as a Class 3 wine. The judges moved it on freshness, and it went on to win the class. It was also a genuine debate between Stanley's wine and Darren's for the category. The panel felt Stanley's was a touch hot on the day, but it will be an exceptional wine in a year or two.
Category 3: Ruby and Tawny (22 entries)
Category Winner: Peter Hanlon, 96/100 (Class 3) 🏆
The Tawnies ran quite dry across the board this year. Peter's showed the best interplay between sugar and tannin, with plenty of vanilla and oak and a finish that put it above the rest.
Class 1 Winner: Carl Moore, 95/100 Gold
Class 2 Winner: Tina, Sarah & Jess, 95/100 Gold
Class 3 Winner: Peter Hanlon, 96/100 Gold
Category 4: Rebel Blend, Open Class (4 entries)
Category Winner: Drew Forrest, 96/100 Gold 🏆
Perfumed and floral with apricot character, sweet and rich with lovely length. A really enjoyable drink. It was originally entered as a Tawny and moved across, because it showed more Muscat character than Tawny and could not be judged fairly where it was. Which is exactly what the Rebel Blend class is for.
Celebrating craftsmanship
Every entrant deserves credit for the time and attention that goes into a barrel over a year. The standard keeps lifting, and this year a few classes came down to real debate between the judges, which is not something we could have said in the early days.
If you took home a silver, do not read it as a near miss. Ninety to ninety-four is an outstanding wine by any measure, and in a show where the top end is getting this tight, the gap between a silver and a gold is often one good top-up away. Your judging notes tell you exactly which one.
If you recognise a few names among the golds, you are not imagining it. A number of them come down to Rutherglen once a year to blend with our winemaker and get properly nerdy about the details. That is not a closed shop. If you cannot get down here but want to know how your wine is tracking, get in touch. We will analyse your blend, talk you through the results, and help you work out what to top up with. It is the part of this job we like best.
All category, class and gold medal winners receive a custom Liquid Luxury rosette for the barrel. Class and category winners also receive a pennant.
Five shows in, and we are already looking at 2027. Keep topping up, keep experimenting, and keep asking us questions.
Full results and benchmarking data for 2026 can be found here [Benchmarking Spreadsheet & Results].
