Penfolds The Rewards of Patience
The Project
180+ years of Penfolds. 75 Years of Grange. Edition 9 of The Rewards of Patience.
Few Australian brands travel as well as Penfolds. In The Rewards of Patience, Penfolds tells its own story through a retrospective tasting record that’s been the standard reference for collectors, sommeliers, and the fine wine trade since the mid-1980s.
This ninth edition is the 40th anniversary publication, comprising 455 pages, 726 vintage reviews, and 253 images. Tastings were conducted over a two-year period from 2024 to 2025 in Paris, Hong Kong, China, London, and Adelaide.
To celebrate 75 years of Grange, this was the first edition to carry a full history of Penfolds alongside the reviews, adding a new dimension to this already classic publication.
Longueville Media was engaged to produce the publication from the manuscript stage to the final printed form and then coordinate delivery logistics for five international markets.
Editorial
Andrew Caillard MW is the author of all nine editions of The Rewards of Patience. He’s a Master of Wine, a wine historian, and the author of the multi-award-winning The Australian Ark: The Story of Australian Wine from 1788 to the Present Day, published by Longueville Media and The Vintage Journal [Eternal link: Details here].
Longueville Media conducted a structural edit to bring the new Penfolds history section and the long-running tasting reviews into a single coherent volume. These were two distinct bodies of writing with different readers in mind, that together provide a new dimension to the Penfolds story.
The tasting reviews were their own challenge. Seventeen reviewers, including Peter Gago AO (Chair & Penfolds Chief Winemaker), Jancis Robinson OBE MW, Andrew Caillard MW, Tamlyn Currin, Dr Angus Hughson, Nick Ryan, Neil Beckett PhD, Jane Anson, Erin Larkin, Edward Ragg MW, each contributed notes from sessions conducted over two years, across the four cities. The copyediting task was to reconcile each review for consistency while retaining the individual author voices.
The completed hardback edition of Penfolds The Rewards of Patience.
Design and Images
The brief: The Rewards of Patience had to adhere to Penfolds corporate branding guidelines, but have a distinctive look to differentiate it from previous editions.
Adding the company history to the book provided an opportunity for a new look and feel – and gave the work new weight and ambition. The design had to give the book an angle not previously included, while staying within the brand’s established editorial language and visual style. Longueville worked closely with the Penfolds team at every stage of the process for more than six months. The 250 images in the book were sourced from across the Penfolds collection and comprised marketing images, bottle shots, and historic images from the Penfolds archive, which contains documents dating back to the 1840s. Each one was colour-corrected, resized, and prepared to press standards.
Production and Distribution
Print coordination and international logistics were managed for the delivery of printed books to Australia, the United Kingdom, the United States, Singapore, and China. Five markets with different freight requirements, trade partners, and timelines.
Delivery
Longueville Media delivered the publication in four variations: a hardback, a paperback, a special hardback edition in a clamshell case, and a special slipcased paperback edition. The result was a beautiful publication that will commemorate and celebrate the Penfolds legacy long into the future.
