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Toast Martinborough
Best for
New Zealand's most beloved wine festival transforms the village of Martinborough into a walkable open-air wine and music event each November. Over 20 Wairarapa wineries set up in the village square and surrounding lanes, with live music stages, food stalls, and picnic rugs on the lawn. The village-scale format and Pinot Noir focus make it New Zealand's most charming wine day.
~9,000 visitors
Wellington Airport (WLG)
Third Sunday of November
$90 - $120
Toast Martinborough is New Zealand's most charming wine day. Held on the third Sunday of November in the small town of Martinborough at the southern tip of the North Island's Wairarapa wine region, it transforms the village square and surrounding lanes into a walkable open-air wine, food, and music event. Twenty-plus Wairarapa wineries pour from stands set up in the village; live music plays on several small stages; nine thousand attendees move on foot between the wineries across the day.
The festival is the single most important commercial day on the Martinborough calendar — for the producers, the village, and the surrounding accommodation — and for a New Zealand wine region of its size, the format is unusually concentrated. Toast is not a tasting fair on a fairground; it is the village itself, given over to wine, for one day.
Why Toast feels different
Martinborough is a planned village laid out in 1879 in the shape of a Union Jack — four main streets radiating from a central square. The wine industry that defines the modern town began only in the late 1970s, when a soil survey identified the gravelly terraces around the village as well-suited to Pinot Noir; the first commercial plantings followed in the early 1980s, and the region has grown into one of the most respected small Pinot Noir districts in the southern hemisphere. The compact geography of the village — a flat ten-minute walk between most of the wineries on the square — is what makes the Toast format possible.
The day runs as a single ticketed event. Each attendee buys a wristband that includes access to the participating winery stands; food and individual wine tastings are purchased separately with festival tokens. The pour stations are spread across the village square, the surrounding lanes, and several of the wineries' own cellar doors within easy walking distance. The result feels closer to a village street fair built around wine than the convention-centre format of a typical wine festival.
Who pours, and the Pinot Noir focus
Martinborough is overwhelmingly a Pinot Noir region — the gravelly free-draining soils and the long dry autumns suit the variety, and the leading estates have built their reputations on it. The most respected names — Ata Rangi, Martinborough Vineyard, Palliser Estate, Dry River, Escarpment — all participate in Toast in some form. The wines poured at the festival are the producers' current commercial releases rather than library bottles, but the depth and consistency of Pinot Noir across twenty estates in a single afternoon is one of the best concentrated Pinot Noir tasting opportunities in the southern hemisphere.
Alongside Pinot Noir, the region produces respected Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Gris, and Riesling, and a small amount of high-quality Syrah from warmer parcels. The Toast format covers the full producer portfolio at each stand, so visitors taste across the regional varietal range rather than only the headline Pinot. For a first-trip visitor, this is the most efficient single-day introduction to the Wairarapa available anywhere in the year.
Tickets, the sellout problem, and how to actually get in
Toast ticket prices have historically sat in the NZ$90–120 range per person, including the wristband and the participating winery access. The festival has a hard attendance cap (the village logistics will not support more than around nine thousand) and the ticket allocation has consistently sold out within minutes of release in recent years. Tickets typically go on sale in June for the November event, with mailing-list subscribers given a brief presale window before general release.
Signing up to the official Toast mailing list at least six months before the festival is the realistic first step. The presale window is the most reliable way to secure tickets; the general release sale window has historically been so brief that having the ticketing page open at the release time is essentially the only way to participate. Resale tickets do circulate in the weeks before the event through verified channels but at meaningful premium.
Where to stay and how to handle the day
Martinborough has a small inventory of village accommodation — boutique hotels, B&Bs, and a handful of larger lodges — and the entire stock is fully booked for the Toast weekend by the time tickets go on sale. The realistic accommodation pattern for visitors not booking accommodation a year in advance is to stay in Featherston (twenty minutes by car), Greytown (fifteen minutes by car), or further afield in Wellington (an hour and a half by car plus the Remutaka Hill drive). The Wairarapa rail line from Wellington runs special Toast services that connect with bus transfers into Martinborough on the day and is materially easier than driving and parking in the village.
Toast is a daytime event in late spring; weather in mid-November in Martinborough is typically mild but variable, with the possibility of wind, sun, and rain across the same afternoon. Layers, sun protection, and comfortable walking shoes are the realistic packing list. The festival closes by early evening and most attendees return to their accommodation for the evening rather than continuing in the village; the village restaurants are heavily oversubscribed during the festival weekend and reservation is essential weeks in advance.
Pair the festival with the Wairarapa
The Wairarapa is one of New Zealand's smaller and quieter wine regions — Martinborough at the south, the wider Wairarapa Valley to the north, the coastal Gladstone sub-region to the east — and outside the Toast weekend it remains under-touristed compared to Marlborough or Central Otago. November is late spring with the vines fully in leaf; the surrounding countryside is at its most photogenic moment of the year.
A natural extension of the Toast weekend is to arrive Friday or Saturday, attend the festival on the Sunday, and spend the Monday and Tuesday visiting individual cellar doors at a slower pace — the producers who poured small portions at the festival are happy to receive serious visitors at their cellar doors the following day, and the wines available in their own cellars are typically deeper than the commercial releases poured at Toast. Combining the Wairarapa with a few additional days in the Hawke's Bay (the larger North Island wine region three hours' drive north) is the standard North Island wine itinerary. Our Wairarapa guide has the cellar door logistics and a recommended four-day itinerary built around the Toast weekend.
Where it is
Martinborough, New Zealand
Official Website
Visit the official site for tickets, schedules, and the latest updates.
Visit WebsiteMake Toast Martinborough the centrepiece of a New Zealand wine trip
Anchor the weekend on the festival, then explore New Zealand wine country either side.
More Wine Festivals
Festivals around the same time
Within two weeks of Toast Martinborough — plan a single trip with multiple stops.
Frequently asked questions
When is Toast Martinborough held?
Third Sunday of November
Where does Toast Martinborough take place?
Toast Martinborough is held in Martinborough, New Zealand.
How much does it cost to attend Toast Martinborough?
Tickets range from NZD 90 to NZD 120.
How many people attend Toast Martinborough?
Approximately ~9,000 visitors attend each edition.
What's the nearest airport to Toast Martinborough?
The nearest airport is Wellington Airport (WLG).
Who is Toast Martinborough best for?
Best for wine enthusiasts and couples.