Hi there... I make wines in Los Angeles with grapes grown in SoCal - from L.A. County, but also down to San Diego, some Riverside and San Bernardino, up to Fillmore and Tehachapi, and a bit of the Sonorous Central Valley thrown in, all with the intent of keeping it close…by which I mean reducing the carbon footprint of course, but also breathing the same air the fruit breathes, drinking the same water, befriending the same bugs.  

 

My wine is about the place: the place where I’m making it, the climate I make it in, the energy that surrounds me when I make it.  Much like the people who populate Los Angeles and its environs, who need to find a way to grow and thrive there, so too does the fruit mother earth nurtures…if it’s growing, then I’ll dance with it and make it into a celebration.

 

Wine-making started for me at the age of about 7, helping my Italian father make a barrel of wine every year (naturally) in a garage in Chicago, with grapes from California. The legacy has come full-circle, making wine in a (larger) garage, like my Italian father, but now in California. I even have the cast-iron wine press he used back then. 

 

Like my father taught me, I let the grapes ferment naturally, and I really don’t bother them much at all throughout the wine-making process - no filtering, no additions, no special requests. 

 

My dance with grapes and Mother Earth is a respectful one - very little machinery used, lighter glass (sometimes even recycled and sterilized). The hand-stamped labels on the bottles are made with a non-petroleum based glue, using water-based ink. 

 

The love I give to the grapes is also infused into the winery and tasting room, and anyone who visits will feel that love too. All of it is part of the product. I consider the space to be the product of bottles opened, and the bottles themselves as time-capsules…little packages of place.  

 

Thanks,

Antonio, Flowers & Cheese