The Taylor family were wine merchants in Sydney before establishing the now-famous winery in the Clare Valley, South Australia. In 1969, Bill Taylor Snr., along with his sons John and Bill, purchased a holding of 178 hectares by the Wakefield River in Auburn and planted Cabernet Sauvignon. The excellent Bordeaux wines such as Mouton-Rothschild had long held a fascination for the Taylor brothers and producing wines of comparable quality in Australia prompted the family’s foray into the winemaking industry. With this goal in mind, the site was carefully chosen for the red brown loam over limestone soils (called terra rossa) and the cool climate of the Clare Valley, known to be excellent for producing Cabernet Sauvignon.


During excavation of the vineyard dam, the fossilised remains of seahorses were uncovered, confirmation that the area was once the bed of an ancient inland sea. The Taylor family thought this to be an omen and testimony that the terra rossa soils were indeed fertile, and with thoughts firmly fixed on their successful future, the family adopted the three seahorses as the company insignia. Today those seahorses are found, on Taylors and Wakefield wine labels, all over the world.