Textile entrepreneur Michael Cohn sells one of Melbourne’s two inner-city working vineyards for eight-figure sum
Businessman and wine maker Michael Cohn, with his wife, Ann, have sold one of just two inner-city Melbourne residential homes to contain a working commercial vineyard.
The Hawthorn property known to some as the Coppin Grove Wines estate, is exchanging for an undisclosed price, speculated to be about $11 million, following a private auction held by agency Kay & Burton yesterday.
The vendors paid $1.4 million for the unique 8174 square metre plot in 1996, building a mansion at one end, near a tennis court and swimming pool, and planting about 1000 vines at the other, on the banks of the Yarra River, producing chardonnay, nebbiolo and pinot noir 
grapes.
Coppin Grove Wines was established as an income-producing business in 1998, operated by the Cohn’s, who undertook prior training at the University of Melbourne.
Four kilometres east of the CBD, the holding (pictured) is said to be one of two inner-city wineries – the other being the nearby Studley Park Vineyard, in Kew, which opened in 1994 on land historically occupied as a market garden.
Several commercial chateaus exist further away from Melbourne, however, including the popular Rose Creek Estate, at the border of Keilor East and Niddrie, 12 kilometres north-west of the CBD, which produces wine, olives and vegetables.
Kay & Burton’s Scott Patterson and Tom Staughton listed the vineyard home in Coppin Grove, Hawthorn, last month.
The agents described the offering as 
Melbourne’s most remarkable riverfront property and one of the ritzy blue-ribbon suburb’s biggest holdings (recently retired Australia Post chief Ahmed Fahour’s Invergowrie, also in Coppin Grove, sits on a larger hectare block. Mr Fahour paid $20 million for this property in 2013, then in 2016, undertook a $4.5 million renovation and extension).
The outgoing Cohn property includes a contemporary three-storey home with four bedrooms, four bathrooms, and several living and dining areas.
In business circles, Mr Cohn is renowned for his business importing and textile distribution company, M Cohn & Associates. He has also sat on the board of Fitted For Work, which has helped more than 24,000 disadvantaged women gain education and work, since 2005.
