Septenary Winery at Seven Oaks Farm and Blenheim Vineyard are two wineries that, at least at a glance, couldn’t seem more different.
Septenary’s tasting room is a historic manor house, giving it a boujee, Instagram-able vibe. They are still serving reds from the 2017 and 2019 vintage as they prefer to age their wines for an extended time.
By contrast, Blenheim’s tasting room is more casual than fancy, although I do enjoy the alpine-lodge view as you walk in. Their wines use screwcaps instead of corks since they are made to be enjoyed fairly young.
Both have different styles of winemaking, but they do have one thing in common – trailblazing female winemakers.
Kirsty Harmon has been Blenheim’s winemaker since 2008, making her one of the longest-tenured female winemakers in Virginia. She was once mentored by Gabriele Rausse (whose own winery is down the street) but has since become a mentor herself.
One of the many she’s mentored was a young harvest intern named Corry Craighill. You may have heard of her – she won the Virginia Governor’s Cup in 2026.
Corry’s main gig is at Septenary, where she’s made wine since 2020. Corry also makes wine for Wound Tight (her private label) and Valley Road.
Septenary Winery
Septenary’s full name is “Septenary Winery at Seven Oaks Farm”. They originally wanted to brand themselves “Seven Oaks” but that name was already taken. So they adopted “Septenary” as reference to the number “7”.
It’s definitely one of the prettiest wineries in the area. The farm is huge, although the size of the vineyard has fluctuated over time. They are currently replanting older blocks, with plans to go from 3 acres to 9 acres, exclusively focused on red varieties (they source white grapes locally, including Blenheim).
Last year I met Corry pouring her Wound Tight brand at an event at Walsh Family wine. I loved her “Root Chatter” (one of the few Saparavis made in Virginia) and “Little Light” (a sauv blanc with some kick), but I had to ask – when are the reds she made at Septenary coming out?
Turns out, not for a while. But she was willing to give me a sneak peek.
Fast forward a year, and Corry kindly organized a small tasting for a small group of friends.
She poured three 2021 vintage red blends and a 2022 cabernet franc. One of these is currently for sale, while the others won’t hit the tasting room until 2027.
I initially thought the delay in introducing these wines was because of a backlog in their wine inventory. Not so, Corry clarified.
It turns out the owners prefer to age their wines for an extended time (16-18 months in barrel, plus 2 years in the bottle). Besides that, they had no fruit in 2020, so 2021 was actually the first time Corry was able to make wine at Septenary.
When you do that math, it makes sense that only now is Septenary introducing their 2021 reds blends, all named from parts of the property.
And I’m here to tell you – they are worth the wait. All of them were good to exceptional, leaning towards a lighter style.
2022 Cabernet Franc: A little bit herbaceous with a spice note. Red pepper but no bell pepper. A lighter expression of cab franc, and very yummy.
2021 Cloverplains (61% Merlot/23% PV/15% Cab Franc): Approachable, but still Old World in style (actually, this can be said for many of her wines). Sweet/confectionary note on the nose. The kind of wine you bring to an event and everyone will enjoy it. It turned out to be very food friendly as well (thank you Greenwood Grocer).
2021 Carriage House (50/50 Merlot and PV): Flashier than the Cloverplains but still graceful, silky. Slightly more oak treatment than previous wine.
2021 Deacon (58% Tannat/42% PV): Notes of purple flower on the nose, and plum on the palate. This was a ‘big’ wine, although not quite as heavy as some other PV/Tannat blends (which is meant as a compliment).
Blenheim Vineyards
Next up was Blenheim.
Kenny Bumbaco had won a group tasting from the We the Wine People auction and graciously invited a group of other friends to join him, myself included. It turned out that Kirsty was guiding our tasting herself.
Kristy has been working in Charlottesville for a while, although she’s also spent time in New Zealand. Her time there inspired her to adopted screwcaps for her wines.
Screwcaps get a bad rap from wine snobs. While the technology behind using them has advanced considerably, they still are primarily used for wines not designed to age.
That said, they make sense for Blenheim, since most of their wines are meant to be enjoyed young. This also allows them to make some of the most affordable Virginia-made wines out there.
Kristy’s extended tasting also showed us that at least some of these wines have aging potential, at least from better vintages.
I don’t have extensive notes on everything, so I’ll summarize what we had instead
2023 “Blanc de Blenheim”: 100% Chardonnay, aged 1 year on the lees. Nice brioche nose despite the relatively short aging time.
2024 Sauv Blanc: This was a dead ringer for a NZ sauv blanc, a style that I find rare in Virginia. Super aromatic.
2024 Chardonnay (made in steel): Bright and crisp. Lots of orchard fruit notes
2023 Chardonnay (oak and steel): More weight, a little creamy
2022 Blenheim Farm Chardonnay (oak and steel): Nutty; my favorite of the 3.
2021 Painted White (blend of Chardonnay/Vio/Sauv Blanc): Very aromatic and a little viscous
2023 Painted White (Chardonnay/Roussanne/Viognier/Sauv Blanc): Complex, but can be enjoyed on its own
Dry Rose’: Grenache and some other grapes I didn’t catch. Loved the orange/salmon color. Savory
2021 Farm Red: Juicy! Jolly rancher notes. A good candidate for a chill-able red. Funny story; Kristy originally named this “Table Red” but ‘a chef’ recommended she change that name. That chef was Jose’ Andreas.
2025 Merlot: Fresh and fruity, with lots of acidity. Made in steel.
2024 Painted Red: Too many grapes in here to name. Very crushable
2012 Painted Red: The surprise of the day. Kristy brought this out as a special treat. Still good, despite everything I said earlier about screwcap-topped wines not being age-able.
I like to host my birthday parties in style. So what better way to celebrate than to do a vertical of my favorite winery – Linden Vineyards. Even better, I was assisted by a group of friends with expert-level palates.
I started with a plan for a 9-vintage comparison of their Hardscrabble red blend. That expanded to 11 vintages. Since I was obviously committed, I decided to add a mini vertical of Hardscrabble Chardonnay.
If you’ve read my blog before, you are likely aware I’m a Linden Vineyards fanboy. But for first-time readers, here is a brief background of the winery and the man behind it, Jim Law.
Jim founded Linden in 1983 on an old apple orchard. Their estate vineyard is named Hardscrabble, which has 20 acres of vines planted between 1,100-1,400’. While Linden’s other (much smaller) vineyards – Avenius and Boisseau – have their own advantages, it’s fair to say Hardscrabble is what Linden is best known for.
Tasting 11 vintages is quite an experience. Virginia wine is renowned for its vintage variation, and that variation was on full display. Each vintage had varying levels of ripeness and acidity, as well as (sometimes dramatically) different blends.
But it was more than vintage variation. While Jim may lean “Old World” in style, he’s not afraid to fine-tune his winemaking approach to whatever the vintage requires.
Linden’s Hardscrabble Blog was of great assistance in this writeup. It provides an incredibly detailed record of every wine Linden has ever produced, down to seasonal growing conditions, individual winemaking notes, and recommended food pairings.
Hardscrabble Chardonnay Vertical (2015-2021)
If you ask Jim what his ‘flagship’ wine is, he’d probably say “Chardonnay”. It remains his first love, and arguably the variety Linden is best known for.
We had 4 vintages – 2015, 2017, 2019, and 2021. All were 100% Chardonnay from the estate Hardscrabble vineyard.
What stood out is how these wines are meant to age. Some were a little reductive, but that was a winemaking decision to ensure they had staying power.
2015 Hardscrabble Chardonnay: Wine Advocate would tell you this is a 95-point wine (the highest-rated Virginia wine at the time of the score). My group would say it was “Yummy!”
During various visits I remember Jim praising this wine, which is memorable since Jim is not a man known for being effusive regarding his own work.
The 2015 HS Chardonnay was extremely well integrated, with notes of hazelnut, baked apple, and maybe a bit of brioche. I also heard vanilla and cream.
It was full bodied, with the nutty characteristics I associate with older Chardonnays. It did have a ‘matchstick’ quality initially when we opened, but that dissipated quickly.
Last we spoke, Jim professed he didn’t think this wine would improve with more age. But having just tasted it, it easily has several more years before I’d be worried about a decline.
2017 Hardscrabble Chardonnay: Also outstanding, in a different way. Fresher than the 2015, more aggressive, with more obvious ripeness in the fruit.
Group tasting notes mentioned hay, white flower, lemon peel, and a yeasty/brioche nose.
2019 Hardscrabble Chardonnay: My group notes focus on strong tropical notes, including pineapple and papaya, as well as green apple. Another participant mentioned cream.
It had good acidity, although it had a shorter finish compared to the earlier vintages. Those tropical notes were the first to drop off.
2021 Hardscrabble Chardonnay: I thought 2019 was tropical…until I had a whiff of this one. The nose completely jumped out of the glass.
This was more botanical on the palate, with more fruit than structure. It was relatively straightforward compared to the earlier wines. I hate calling it ‘easy drinking’ because that underscores its quality. But comparatively speaking, it was the easiest drinking of the four.
Hardscrabble Red Vertical (2012-2023)
For the reds, I decanted the 2021 and 2022 bottles for 3 hours each, and the 2023 for 4 hours. This was crucial since I was worried these younger wines wouldn’t show well, particularly the 2023.
In retrospect I wish I had decanted the 2017 and 2019 bottles as well. A late decanting of the 2017 helped it evolve, but by then our ‘favorites’ were mostly selected.
Most of these wines had Cabernet Sauvignon as their dominant grape, although sometimes not by much (only in the 2015 and 2020 vintages was Cabernet equaled by another grape).
Note: there is no 2018 Hardscabble red, so this is 11 vintages over a 12 year spread.
2012 Hardscrabble Red: 56% Cabernet Sauvignon, 34% Merlot, 9% Cabernet Franc, and 1% Petit Verdot. Aged in new (30%) and slightly used French oak barrels for 21 months. 14.4% alc.
This was one of the best wines of the day, with several participants selecting it as their #1 wine. Rereading Jim’s Hardscrabble blog I can see he was very conservative in his description, listing it as “Drink now till 2021”.
We found the 2012 Hardscrabble red to be surprisingly bright and fresh, with years left on it. It was tannic but not overly so.
Despite being 14 years old it was still showing primary and secondary characteristics. Tasting profile notes list black fruit on the palate that was just starting to evolve into dried fruit. Other descriptors include notes of black raspberry and violets.
The only downside was this wine’s best characteristics faded not long after we sampled it. If you open one – don’t let it sit for long.
2013 Hardscrabble Red: 57% Cabernet Sauvignon, 32% Merlot, and 11% Cabernet Franc. Aged in new (30%) and slightly used French oak barrels for 21 months. 13.7% alc.
Important note here; this was our only 375ml bottle of the day, which impacted the wine’s tasting profile. The smaller format likely caused this wine to taste ‘older’ than it should have (although admittedly it was from a relatively weaker vintage than, say, the 2012).
We felt this wine had lots of tertiary notes, with an emphasis on tannin and structure. But we struggled to find the fruit, so it wasn’t as highly rated as the others. Jim projected a ‘drink through 2023’ date, although that’s hard for me to independently verify given my smaller-format bottle.
2014 Hardscrabble Red: 81% Cabernet Sauvignon and 19% Merlot. Aged in new (50%) and slightly used French oak barrels for 21 months. 12.5% alc.
This wine was somewhat divisive. If you love ‘funky’ Bordeaux-like Old World wines, you’d like this one.
While we found some brett, it wasn’t present at a level we considered a fault (mostly on the nose, rather than the palate).
Group notes mentioned black cherry, and somewhat tart and astringent. It had high acidity but surprisingly it was only 12.5% alcohol. Someone mentioned ‘dainty cherry’ on the nose.
2015 Hardscrabble Red: 46% Cabernet Sauvignon, 35% Merlot, and 19% Cabernet Franc. Aged in new (50%) and slightly used French oak barrels for 21 months. 13.4% alc.
Ranking the favorites afterwards, this was our #3 wine of the day. The 2015 Hardscrabble blog notes Jim was very happy with this year.
The group had plenty of notes; so many it was hard to capture them all.
On the nose someone mentioned a candied quality, maybe violet. Someone else mentioned notes of iron or sanguine. On the palate it had fruit tannin, leaning towards a sweet fruit with a licorice finish.
That finish was something we talked about. It was a surprising “New World” style wine.
2016 Hardscrabble Red: 56% Cabernet Sauvignon, 41% Merlot and 3% Cabernet Franc. Aged in new (60%) and slightly used French oak barrels for 21 months. 13.8% alc.
This was another hit. I’d go so far as to say this wine was the surprise of the day (at least for me).
2016 doesn’t exactly strike me as one of the more memorable years in VA wine history, either for positive or negative qualities. Jim notes it was an uncommonly dry September that produced ripe grapes and mature tannins.
This was one of the softer wines of the lineup. I’m tempted to say this has a ‘drink now’ quality, but keep in mind it’s a 10-year bottle that was showing extremely well. It wasn’t showing any evidence of decline, but the consensus seems to be it won’t get any better.
We thought it had very ripe fruit and soft tannins. I wasn’t able to capture any fruit notes from the group (my excuse is I’m too busy writing things down) but we enjoyed this immensely.
2017 Hardscrabble Red: 57% Cabernet Sauvignon and 43% Merlot. Aged in new (70%) and slightly used French oak barrels for 22 months. 13.7% alc.
“Smoldering” was my favorite descriptor for this wine. I very much regret not decanting it because it went from good to even better over time. Linden’s Hardscrabble blog notes Jim was very happy with this vintage.
This wine has structure and power, with a long finish. Good acidity and ripe fruit were mentioned. Group notes include blackberry, pomegranate, big tannins and a big finish, with the nose becoming even more expressive as it opened.
Pair this with steak (and invite me).
2019 Hardscrabble Red: 65% Cabernet Sauvignon, 19% Cabernet Franc and 16% Merlot. Aged in new (70%) and slightly used French oak barrels for 22 months. 13.1% alc.
This wine was ‘showy’, possibly because it was the product of an especially hot year so it just had that ‘come look at me’ vibe (when compared to the smoldering glances of the 2017).
Overall opinions were fairly divided. It had big fruit tannins, wasn’t as integrated as we would have liked. Chewy. Notes of raspberry, black raspberry, and plum.
This was another wine I wish I had decanted. We didn’t love this wine as much as the rest of the lineup, but I suspect that opinion would change if we gave it a few more years and some aeration. The Hardscrabble blog projects drink now till 2030, and that’s more than fair.
2020 Hardscrabble: 45% Cabernet Sauvignon, 45% Cabernet Franc and 10% Merlot. Aged for 12 months in used French oak barrels for Merlot and Cabernet Franc and new oak for the Cabernet Sauvignon. 13.3% alc.
This was possibly the biggest change in terms of style in the entire lineup because it was 45% Cab Franc; the largest percentage ever in this wine.
This year isn’t a favorite for much of Virginia because of the frost that devastated many vineyards. The year was characterized by fairly mild heat, so ripening was an issue. This was a vintage that favored Cab Franc, so Jim used it appropriately.
I didn’t get many tasting notes; mostly raspberry and an emphasis on it being floral. Perfectly nice wine with dinner, but not the show-stopper of several others in the lineup.
2021 Hardscrabble Red: 95% Cabernet Sauvignon and 5% Cabernet Franc. Aged for 12 months in used and new French oak barrels. 12.9% alc.
Off the bat we were wowed by this nose. It wasn’t as structured as the other Hardscrabble wines of the day but made up for it by being elegant, hedonistic and delicious.
Tasting notes included flavors of stewed strawberry, blackberry, and cherry. I also heard black raspberry and vanilla.
We had differing opinions on its age-ability. I’d say it was more “New World” in style. If I was going to party and needed a wine everyone would like, I’d bring this.
2022 Hardscrabble Red: 82% Cabernet Sauvignon, 16% Cabernet Franc, and 2% Merlot. Aged for 12 months in used and new French oak barrels. 13.3% alc.
Another very expressive wine, although some noted it was edging towards being green. I heard differing opinions on its ripeness. The Hardscrabble blog put 2026 as the early window for opening this bottle, although it would benefit from another year of aging.
Tasting notes include a flavor of espresso; first on the nose then the palate. Smoked fruit on the palate, even jalapeno. I didn’t see it initially, but upon a re-taste two days later I understood what Jim meant by how this wine had exceptionally ‘fine’ tannins.
Based on our scoring, this wine wasn’t enjoyed as much as some others. But given it’s one of the youngest, I think that opinion will change over time.
This wine had structure yet plenty of ripeness. Powerful and complex. I heard someone mention notes of Black Forest cake; while another said cherry liqueur. Notes of violet were mentioned.
This was everything you want in a wine right now, yet it’s still going to get better. I admit…I opened a 2nd bottle on the spot to share more.
Important note: for much of 2026 this wine wasn’t for sale to the general public, so I joined Linden’s “Winegrowers Selection” club specifically to access it. It went for sale right after my event, and now I need more.
Overall Favorites
Hardscrabble Chardonnay: By a narrow margin, 4 participants favored the 2017 Hardscrabble Chardonnay, while 3 preferred 2015. No votes favored either 2019 or 2021.
I do have to say; 2015 vs 2017 was close. I started on Team 2017, but after re-tasting 2015 two days later I regretted my earlier vote.
Hardscrabble Red: It was a showdown between 2012 and 2023 for top wines of the evening, with 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017 competing for 3rd favorite.
For the 2012 vs 2023 comparison, which was favored often depended on when you tried it.
If you went by ‘first taste’ out the gate, then 2012 may have had an edge. But several hours later it faded while 2023 was still going strong.
That said, the 2023 Hardscrabble red was (more-or-less) the top wine of the night.
The 2023 was the only red that all 7 voters selected as one of their “Top 3” wines of the day. That’s remarkable given it was also the youngest wine of my lineup and will only get better with age.
As much as I loved these two wines, I also need to give credit to the 2015, 2016, and 2017 Hardscrabble reds (although if you like Old World funk, you’d go for the 2014).
I know Jim admires the 2015 vintage, so having a 2015 red in our lineup of favorites wasn’t surprising. My understanding is this was a slightly cooler vintage but dry and warm enough for good ripening. Great choice for 3rd overall favorite.
The 2017 Hardscrabble red also had several supporters. It leaned “Old World” in style, to the point that at a separate blind tasting event, my guest from Bordeaux threw down the “I’m from Bordeaux, I can recognize Bordeaux!” line only to be surprised to learn she was wrong.
That said, the 2016 Hardscrabble red was absolutely peaking. Given it was from an otherwise ‘normal’ vintage, this was a shockingly strong showing.
View from the tasting room
Final Observations
A few, but I’ll keep them brief.
First, Linden wines emphasize restraint over power. Even the ‘biggest’, most powerful vintages were unmistakably Linden-esque. It was easy to see Jim prefers “Old World” finesse vs “New World” showy-ness.
Second, Linden’s wines are also especially ageable. This was something I knew going in, yet it was another thing to sample it first-hand. That a 2012 Hardscrabble red and a 2015 Hardscrabble Chardonnay could be so delicious despite being over a decade old was a remarkable achievement.
Third, the 2023 vintage might be one of his best yet. I’ve known for a while that 2023 wines are going to break records for overall quality. The 2023 Hardscrabble red proved it (and at $65 it’s an absolute steal).
Lastly, sleeper vintages were some of our favorites. Linden allows each wine to be an expression of its vintage, so variation was expected. But the reality is that some vintages simply have weather favoring them in a way other years don’t. That led me to privately bet in advance that 2017 and 2023 (two stereotypically ‘good’ vintages) would end up as the night’s favorites.
So you can imagine my surprise at how well received both 2015 and 2016 were. Maybe it was the luck of tasting it at exactly the right moment, but those reds were hitting just right.
It’s not difficult for Virginia wine lovers to find a headline that reads, ‘Winery for sale’. Between slowing wine sales internationally, climate change creating difficult conditions for viticulture, and invasive insects which damage vineyards, saying ‘these are tough times for the wine industry’ may undersell the challenges local wineries face.
The momentum that propelled the industry for decades is indeed shifting. The Virginia wine industry has grown non-stop since the 1980s. Between 2005 and 2025 alone, the number of local tasting rooms grew from 100 to nearly 300.
This growth stalled in 2025. For the first time in the history of the modern Virginia wine industry, there were more winery closings (10) than openings (3).
It would be easy to blame these shifts on the wine industry’s wider downturn. Between tariffs and extreme weather events, local owners may be more inclined than ever to look for an exit plan.
The overall picture is far more complicated.
A Rebalancing in the Virginia Wine Industry
For starters, there is a generational shift in winery ownership.
Owners have traditionally preferred sales to be kept private until the last moment to avoid alarming their regular clientele. The increasingly public nature of recent transactions may indicate there is less of a stigma over having a ‘for sale’ sign than in the past.
While there is very real economic pressure on the wine industry, the number of wineries for sale has increased only modestly in recent years, according to Janine Aquino, a Virginia-based real estate agent specializing in winery acquisitions.
“5 years ago, there were maybe 30 wineries for sale. Today, there are around 40, mainly from legacy owners wanting to retire. It’s a shifting of the guard, not the doomsday that everyone makes this out to be,” Aquino explained via email.
Aquino points to another trend. Many of today’s wineries have been in business for more than a decade, often under owners who retired from a previous career or continue to run another business.
This suggests the perceived surge in winery sales is at least as much about legacy owners wanting to move to the next chapter of their lives as it is about financial stress. The issue can be particularly acute for owners who do not have children willing to take over the family business.
Even wineries that are at the top of their game are looking to sell or close.
Warrenton’s Granite Heights Winery is among them. Owners Toni and Luke Kilyk’s 2024 Humility earned a Top-12 spot in the 2026 Virginia Governor’s Cup wine competition. Yet soon afterward, the couple announced they were closing the winery.
“Luke and I started this business 18 years ago from the ground up,” Toni explained. “For a mom and pop winery to have been in the Governor’s case twice in 10 years implies we are doing something right.
Though we still have our other jobs, we decided to retire from the wine business to have more free time to travel and visit with friends and relatives.”
The Kilyks are hardly alone. Many of Virginia’s most famous brands are not just changing hands; their new owners are also looking for opportunities to expand.
In 2024, RdV Vineyards was purchased by Château Montrose, a high-end winery in Bordeaux. Two years later, both Barboursville and Veritas Vineyards went under new ownership.
At Barboursville, the new ownership group has pledged to continue investing in the property’s wine, hospitality, and historic grounds. Veritas’ new owners are likewise expanding their overnight lodging program, which Aquino described as a critical component of the winery’s future success.
Even the 2025 reversal may be a blip. In Northern Virginia alone, 2026 has already seen the opening of Silver Dog Vineyards and Ovoka Farm. Wildkind Estate, OH Vineyard, and others are not far behind.
Ownership Isn’t the Only Thing Changing
This generational change is affecting Virginia wine in other ways. New owners are increasingly choosing to rely on contract winemakers for production. Other wine brands are opting to forego a physical tasting room altogether.
The rise of ‘wine incubators’ such as Common Wealth Crush, The Virginia Wine Collective, and Walsh Family Wine demonstrates this trend.
These incubators fill a crucial role by giving new wine brands access to space, equipment, and winemaking expertise without the expense of building a winery of their own. This has been especially beneficial for communities that have traditionally had limited representation in the wine world.
Incubators have also helped fuel the rise of ‘micro-brands.’ These ultra-small production brands primarily sell their wine through pop-up events and retail rather than through a traditional tasting room.
There are benefits to keeping a wine brand small. Unlike larger brick-and-mortar wineries, these micro-brands don’t have the expenses associated with a physical tasting room. Limited inventory also reduces their exposure to the financial risks of an industry awash in unsold wine.
Perhaps most importantly, the small-batch nature of their model means these owners can take stylistic risks that larger brands may shy away from. Wines made through Common Wealth Crush, for example, have focused on lighter, more approachable styles (many using hybrid grapes) that have resonated with younger drinkers.
Change is nothing new for Virginia wine. The pioneers who helped establish the modern industry in the 1970s largely started with mom-and-pop wineries that relied heavily on hybrid grapes. Over time, the industry learned that vinifera grapes capable of producing fine wine could thrive in Virginia. More recently, wineries have pivoted toward event-based models and added non-alcoholic options to meet changing consumer demands.
This latest generational change is not just inevitable; it may be healthy for the industry. Business models that worked 20 years ago may be increasingly out of sync with the demands of today’s wine market, particularly as the industry’s traditional clientele gets older.
So raise a glass to what this latest generation of winery owners will bring.
Lucie Morton and DuCard Vineyards are one heck of a combo. An event with either would interest me. Combining them is enough to make me giddy.
This past weekend Lucie gave a presentation that ranged from how she got into ampelography, her research proving Norton and Cynthiana are different grapes, to her upcoming documentary Immigrant Grapes: The Odyssey of Forbidden Wines which documents the diaspora of American hybrid grapes, and Cunningham in particular, in the late 19th century.
If that’s not enough, I was able to get a sample of DuCard’s 2023 Norton and his sparkling Norton/Vio blend, Dorothy’s Slippers (although my favorite of the day was the excellent 2023 Triskele red blend).
I don’t recall this event being named, but I’d like to think of it as “hybrid-palooza”. And BTW -this was the latest in long list of great events hosted by DuCard.
For wine lovers who’ve never been – you’re missing out on a place that’s one of my Top-10 wineries in the state. Not only do I love the wine, DuCard has hosted everything from guest speakers like Lucie, “Dark Sky” astronomy viewings, and chocolate pairings with a Master Chocolatier who works with Lindt.
But I digress. Let’s talk about Lucie.
Lucie gave an informal lecture to a packed room, starting with a recap of her career as an ampelographer; a specialist who studies and identifies grapevines. So rare is this field only a few people are recognized as practicing it, and Lucie is perhaps the most famous ampelographer in the world.
Her accomplishments are too numerous to mention them all, so I’ll just list some highlights:
• It was Lucie who first translated Précis d’Ampélographie Pratique (A Practical Ampelography: Grapevine Identification), a seminal work on the subject
• She helped prove California nurseries were inadvertently selling plant material that was already infected with undiscovered diseases, thus saving vineyards down the line from planting diseased vines
• Lucie also helped popularize the practice of planting vineyard rows tightly together. She understood early on that such dense plantings reduced the water available to the vines, forcing them to struggle. Since struggling vines produce better fruit, that resulted in better wine.
But you know what accomplishment she’s most thrilled to discuss? That she got to name one of the diseases she discovered.
And best of all, she named it “Black Goo”.
So yeah – she’s pretty much the most down-to-earth person you could meet.
After her introduction, we did a deep dive on one of her favorite subjects – hybrid grapes.
Norton and Cynthiana – Not the Same Grape!
She set the tone with one of my favorite quotes of the day: “Immigrant grapes were discriminated against, as all immigrants are”.
Hybrid grapes are almost by definition immigrants, as they have both American and European DNA. This combo makes themvery weather and disease resistant, traits that winemakers love.
Unfortunately, wine snobs have traditionally looked down on such grapes, making them less commercially appealing. This is despite her insistence that “young consumers don’t want snobby vinifera”.
Lucie doesn’t have any tolerance for wine snobbery. She quoted one winemaker who said “There are no bad grape varieties. Only bad winemakers,” which summarizes her views on the subject.
Norton is one such ‘immigrant grape,’ although to this day its exact DNA ancestry isn’t clear. But it’s not just the ancestry of Norton that’s confusing, its identifying what grapes are *actually* Norton.
Norton often referred to by another name – Cynthiana. Many places use the names Cynthiana and Norton interchangeably.
But some years ago, Lucie realized something – Norton and Cynthiana are in fact two different grapes that were mistakenly mixed together. And she’s been fighting to get this fact recognized for years.
From what I’ve gathered so far, Norton juice is somewhat darker and more rustic, while Cynthiana is a little more graceful. Unfortunately, plantings of the two are now so mixed together around the state it’s almost impossible to separate them.
Lucie is so good at her job she can tell the two apart just by examining their leaves:
• Norton: According to her, Norton leaves are ‘shaped like a bat’. It also has a rougher underside
• Cynthiana: Has a smoother underside, and no ‘bat wings’
• While I originally thought these two varieties might be cousins, apparently, they are more distantly related than I originally thought. Maybe not cousins at all, in fact.
She even did a little show-and-tell. Not sure if you can tell in the photos, but the leaf on the left is Norton, while the right one is Cynthiana.
Left: Norton. Right: Cynthiana
Immigrant Grapes: The Odyssey of Forbidden Wines
Our chat about Norton was a natural segue about hybrid grapes in general, including an upcoming documentary called The Odyssey of Forbidden Wines.
The documentary is spiritual successor of another film she participated in; Vitis Prohibita. But whereas the former was specifically about French American hybrid grapes that are ‘forbidden’ in France, Odyssey is specifically about the Cunningham grape, and broadly about the journey of largely forgotten American grapes that found their way overseas.
It turns out that Cunningham is something of a ‘spirit grape’ for Lucie in particular. You might say it’s part of her family history.
Her ancestors are Huguenots (French Protestants) who she can trace back to the 16th century, from the Champagne region of France.
Religious oppression forced them to flee their homeland. And their means of escape?
To hide in wine barrels during their crossing from France into Holland. Because of course that’s how a relative of Lucie Morton would escape to freedom.
She has another connection to this grape. Lucie believes these same ancestors took with them seeds of a French cultivar named Meslier Petit, which today is a minor white grape still used in Champagne.
Those ancestors eventually immigrated to Virginia, where she believes they planted Meslier Petit. Those French vines in turn pollinated an unknown American grape, leading to the creation of a red grape known as Bland.
Bland in turn is the parent for the source of Lucie’s current fascination: Cunningham. This grape originated in 1812 in Prince Edward County (also home to Lucie’s family farm) and was a popular varietal in 19th century American winemaking.
This timing is important. The worldwide spread of phylloxera devastated European vineyards, forcing winemakers to rely upon American grapes (including Cunningham) for several decades before the widespread use of grafting. Once grafting took off, those grapes dropped in popularity.
Dropped – but didn’t disappear. While France eventually banned the planting of American hybrids, some rural farmers hid their hybrid grapes and continued to make them in secret (I can’t recommend Vitis Prohibita enough to learn more).
It’s fortunate these farmers secretly kept their vines, because Cunningham disappeared when Prohibition forced US farmers to tear out their vineyards.
That backstory led to Lucie’s most recent mission – to bring back Cunningham to the USA.
I won’t narrate the entire film, but the short version is not only did she find Cunningham in France, but she also found it on the Portuguese island of Madeira.
It turns out that Cunningham’s leaves are so distinctive she recognized them immediately shortly after arriving on the island. Lucie even knocked on a stranger’s door to ask if she could inspect a vine she saw in his yard (she has a running joke she can recognize grapes from the passenger side of a car going 30 miles an hour).
You’d think Madeira is an odd choice for Cunningham, but there is a logic to local farmers continuing to use it even after other options became available. Cunningham is a high-sugar grape, which Lucie noted makes it especially useful in making fortified wine (Isabella is another grape she discovered on the island).
Suffice to say Cunningham’s journey back to the US has been arduous – but ultimately successful. Lucie finally got her vines and planted them at her family farm, Morland, along the bank of the Potomac.
Immigrant Grapes: The Odyssey of Forbidden Wines is still being shopped around at film festivals and awaiting a distributor. But I’m really looking forward to it, and DuCard owner Scott Elliff suggested he might host a viewing party.
Go see it. And pair the viewing with a 2023 Norton…or Triskele.
