Black and white portrait of wine expert Campbell Mattinson with a beard, wearing a cap, looking contemplative with his hand resting on his chin against a dark background.

Campbell Mattinson

Australian Wine Critic / Journalist / Photographer / Writer

Campbell Mattinson has been a journalist for 40 years. He’s been a wine critic for 25 years. He works for himself because he values independence.

Campbell Mattinson is the author of five books on wine. Four of Campbell Mattinson’s wine books were bestsellers (The Wine Hunter, the Big Red Wine Book 2008, the Big Red Wine Book 2009, and the Big Red Wine Book 2010). He is a former chief editor of the Halliday Wine Companion book, former editor of Halliday magazine, former editor of Australian Sommelier Magazine and founder of The Winefront business.

Campbell Mattinson is the only Australian to have won the Australian Wine Communicator of the Year Award more than once. He’s a past winner of a Louis Roederer International Wine Media Award; is the author of the award-winning book The Wine Hunter; and is the author of the best-selling novel We Were Not Men. He’s also a winner of a St Kilda Film Festival Award (as writer-director) and is a former winner of the prized Best Australian Sports Writing Award. In 2026 three of his photographs were short-listed for the World Food Photography Awards.

Campbell Mattinson, who is 100% independent, has tasted between 5000 and 10,000 wines each and every year for the past 25 years. He tastes blind, in comparative brackets, as often as is practicable.

Mattinson shares his wine discoveries, reviews and insights on the Review page of the Mattinson site, or on The Winefront, or on his Instagram account. Campbell Mattinson is a journalist, a photographer, a filmmaker and a wine critic. In all of these mediums his prime motive is to tell people's stories.

Campbell is the author of the following wine books:

Campbell has won the following journalism awards:

  • 1995  Independent Monthly Young Writer of the Year Award

  • 1996 Best Australian Sports Writing Award

  • 2004 Wine Press Club Wine Communicator Award

  • 2005 R/U Wine Press Club Wine Communicator Award

  • 2006 Wine Press Club Wine Communicator Award (The Wine Hunter).

  • 2013 Wine Press Club Best Feature Article

  • 2016 Louis Roederer International Wine Writers’ Awards Chairman’s Award