Our Story

Established in 1997 in the Yarra Valley, Giant Steps has built a reputation based on expressive wines with purity and finesse. The Giant Steps wines are a direct reflection of their individual vineyard sites, located across the Yarra Valley from Tarrawarra to Gladysdale.

Giant Steps was founded by wine industry pioneer Phil Sexton, who ventured from Margaret River to Yarra Valley to find the ideal site to cultivate Chardonnay and Pinot Noir of purity and finesse.

Phil found his holy grail near Gruyere in the Sexton vineyard, which he planted in 1997 on the steep slopes of the Warramate Ranges. A mad jazz fan, Phil named the winery after John Coltrane’s album and fitting metaphor “Giant Steps.”

In 2003, Winemaker Steve Flamsteed came aboard, and the two set about producing a range of iconic Pinot Noirs and Chardonnays that express a profound sense of place from six finite sites in Yarra Valley.

"I've been tasting and drinking these wines for a seriously long time, and that's because I've loved them forever." - Winemaker, Mel Chester

For Melanie Chester, who became Head of Winemaking and Viticulture at Giant Steps in 2021, this long-held admiration for the winery comes with an intrinsic pressure to honour the expressions and diversity of its single sites. This means keeping the winemaking tight and transparent, so that diversity of site is what you taste. “The wines will never look the same because the vineyards continue to change,” she explains, “but we are committed to ensuring that the quality will be the same if not better.”

For more than 20 years, Giant Steps has been advancing Australia’s reputation for cool-climate Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. But we would be remiss if we didn’t mention that a huge part of our story is you, our loyal followers. Thank you to the heights of Bastard Hill and beyond for the love.

Giant Steps Awarded 2025 Halliday Winery of the Year and Pinot Noir of the Year

We are absolutely rapt to announce that Giant Steps has been named Winery of the Year and the 2023 Applejack Pinot Noir Best Pinot Noir at the 2025 Halliday Companion Awards. “It’s really wonderful to see the dedication and hard work of our entire Giant Steps team acknowledged in such a profound way,” says Melanie Chester, GM and Head Winemaker at Giant Steps. “Giant Steps has always had an unwavering commitment to create high quality wines that tell the stories of our sites, which we see as some of the most exciting vineyards in the country. It was a real thrill to see our winery next to the list of nominees, and now to stand among the past winners feels like a recognition of the consistency and quality that we work hard to produce.”

It’s an achievement that is years in the making. As Campbell Mattinson penned in his recent article on the first Giant Steps vintage of Bastard Hill “Giant Steps’ preparation for this moment has been long and it has been specific. It’s been about lands, little lands, slices…These lands and these people and the teams by their side; these carriages and creators of history; these shoulders. It’s taken a river to reach the source of it.”

These creators include founder Phil Sexton, winemaker Steve Flamsteed, grower Lou Primavera and respected viticulturist Ray Guerin. In 1997, Ray planted Applejack Vineyard, a unique site located on a dramatic slope in the upper Yarra Valley, and in 2013, Giant Steps became the custodian of this special piece of land. In the words of Mel Chester, Applejack is “truly exceptional – one of the great Pinot Noir sites in Australia.”