(Manfred Klimek / Pic Animation: Runwayml)
Jutta Ambrositsch was already, before she Marco Kalchbrenner met him, a brilliant young graphic designer from Carinthia in Vienna. Someone who could not merely read typography, but think it. Marco, meanwhile, came from text, from language, from the precise placement of meaning – and he, the man from Southern Burgenland, was likewise one of the best. The two met in the advertising world – where they could easily have continued their already very impressive careers; right up to running their own agency. In the 1990s, that would have meant cash, awards and parties. They chose something serious instead – winemaking.
What the two have been doing there for almost twenty years now is anything but superficial. On the slopes of Vienna’s vineyards, around Nussberg, Riesenberg and Bisamberg, they make wines that are not decorative, but at times dramatically positioned. Wines with inner order, clarity and astonishing self-confidence. Organically certified, uncompromising in their work, independent in expression – and above all: completely autonomous. They did not have to ask anyone how to make wine “properly”. They taught themselves. And that is precisely why nothing feels learned, foreign or contrived. That is why the two of them and their wines are always singular.
This autonomy does not end in the cellar. It continues in the marketing, in their outward journey, in the remarkably high export share of around 75 per cent, especially to the USA and Canada. Ambrositsch and Kalchbrenner are citizens of the world in the best sense: curious, open, present – without trying to ingratiate themselves. Their wines go out into the world because they are immediately understood as extraordinary in urban circles. Not because someone has to explain them.
For almost two years now, there has been a second place as well. One that does not call a metropolitan neighbourhood its own, but seems almost otherworldly: the Csaterberg in Southern Burgenland, a vineyard idyll enclosed by forest and divided into many small parcels. This is where Jutta’s family vineyards lie, and where another side of the two reveals itself. Not a departure from Vienna – rather an expansion; the sublime complement. A place where origin, memory and the present overlap.
Three wines come from this Csaterberg, and they are more than a side project. They are a second voice. The project operates under the name “Waelder”.
The entry-level wine is called “Aufwaerts” 2024 – a cuvée of Welschriesling, Müller-Thurgau and Pinot Blanc. An everyday wine, yes. But not without ambition. Fruity, nutty, with that Southern Burgenland warmth that does not become broad, but carries. The soil speaks clearly: serpentinite, opal, a touch of slate – a Hungarian influence that feels structural rather than folkloric. A wine that does not mistake lightness for weightlessness.
This is followed by “Himmelwaerts” 2024, Chardonnay, currently still a barrel sample. A wine that will take its time – and demands it, too. It is not quite itself yet, and is still arranging its components. But even now it is clear that the aim here is not quick readability, but depth. One to lay down. And want to.
And then there is “Hoellwaerts” 2024. Blaufränkisch. Forty-year-old vines. A single 600-litre barrel. Ten days on the skins – deliberately brief, so that the colour does not dominate, the lighter coming before the darker; and in no way hellish. What emerges here is genuinely something rare: a wine that almost everyone must like – and yet fulfils extremely high standards.
On the nose, mulberries, graphite, a hint of egg white. More sweet cherry than sour cherry. Muted cassis, blueberry, a touch of nut. But all of that is almost beside the point. What matters is the palate: juicy, firm, dense yet light, always completely effortless (that is not to say that demanding, more challenging wines do not have every right to exist – they do). A Blaufränkisch with drive, with inner pressure, with that irresistible quality that makes you reluctant to put the glass down and glance towards the next bottle while drinking. Positively populist, if you like. A perfect quaffing wine – and at the same time one of the most substantial Blaufränkisch wines of recent years.
Finally, a tip that is more than a recommendation: drink “Hoellwaerts” together with “Hetfleisch”, the project that Ambrositsch and Kalchbrenner have made by the younger winemaker Christoph Wachter-Wiesler . Two wines, two notes of attitude, one common denominator: seriousness without pathos, pleasure without simplification. We will also be devoting detailed attention to Wachter-Wiesler’s work in the coming days.
What remains is an impression that goes beyond individual bottles. Jutta Ambrositsch and Marco Kalchbrenner make wines that cannot and do not want to explain how good they are. They are it. And sometimes – increasingly often – a wine emerges that achieves something greater: a wine that embraces the world.