Super natural wines at Paranormal in Campbell

He was never really interested in the wine side of things.

"I always thought that wine was a bit too scary, and a bit too hard, there was so much to learn, I'll just stick to my beers and cocktails," he says.

He moved to Australia a few years later, working at Movida Aqui in Melbourne, and that's where his interest in wines began to develop.

"We had this thing where the bar staff and the chefs would get together on Saturday nights after we closed and we each had to bring a bottle of wine and give a spiel about it.

"Nobody was a sommelier, no one knew more than anyone else, it was a nice open forum to start to dip your toes into a very large and serious subject.

"And it was always a lot of fun."

This is what he hopes his bottle shop Paranormal Wines will be like, a comfortable place to explore wines without judgement.

For Walker is now extremely knowledgeable in the area of wine. During his years in Melbourne, a few in Sydney where he was the general manager at LP's Quality Meats, a short stint at Bar Rochford when he first moved to Canberra, he became fascinated by natural wines, those with minimal intervention, organic wines.

That's the focus at Paranormal Wines - "paranormal just means 'not normal', I wanted to get across the idea that the wines might be a little left field."

There are wines from places such as Italy, Germany and New Zealand, about a third is from Australia. Local wines to feature include Ravensworth, Mada and Mallaluka. With Mallaluka's Sam Leyshon, Walker has developed the Paranormal rose.

"It's nice to have our own wine," he says.

Walker says while there are plenty of wines you might not have seen before, it's all still very approachable

"Introducing people to new varieties and new areas and new techniques is what's really exciting for me.

"It comes back down to those Movida days ... I was there for someone's first anchovy, someone's first oyster, someone's first glass of a wine they'd never had before.

"Being part of that gives me a real buzz, it's about sharing knowledge, there's too much gate-keeping in the wine industry, food and wine should be about sharing knowledge."

As well as the retail side, there's also the opportunity to enjoy a glass in house with a bite to eat. There's a small menu of sourdough and butter, burratas, marinated peppers and goats cheese, charcuterie selections from LPs Meats. There's a good size kitchen just waiting for something more. Walker likes the idea of the occasional pop-up, but for the moment the focus is on the wine.

There's seating inside the space, some out on the footpath, the park across the road might be a nice option on a warm summer's evening.

Walker is loving Canberra. He moved here as his partner, arts administrator Georgia Hobbs, has family here.

"There's such a great bunch of people working in the industry here," he says.

"But the clientele are great as well. Canberra people are generally very cultured, very well travelled, they have been to larger cities and travelled internationally.

"When something new happens they kind of jump on it because they're like that reminds me of Berlin or New York. When I first went into Bar Rochford it was a little bit Melbourne, a little bit New York, I just loved it and the customers were so polite and friendly."