We are delighted to announce the release of Hafner Vineyard’s first sparkling wine, our 2020 Blanc de Blancs. This has been many years in the making, and we are excited to share it with you. As the name implies, it is made of 100% Chardonnay and produced in the “Méthode Champenoise”. Making sparkling wine is different from still wine, so we wanted to give you a behind the scenes look at the past few years many our first vintage.
We have a longstanding intern program that began in 1985 when a friend of a friend asked if we would host a French enology student. A few years earlier, Sarah and I were interns in Burgundy and realized how impactful an internship could be, so it was easy for us to say “Yes!” Fast forward to 2023 and we welcomed our 38th intern…Jonas Armagnacq to our winery and our home. He has quickly become part of the family both at home and at the winery, bringing hard work and a lot of laughter to our days.
For me, nothing says Summer like a glass of chilled Rosé…it reminds us of a trip to Provence where we discovered Rosé back in 1985. After a long day at the winery, we enjoy sipping Rosé on our terrace with family and friends. Our Rosé program began as an experiment to intensify the color of our red wines. In 2011, we began making it for our patrons and due to its popularity, we now make 50% from saignée juice and 50% is made direct to press. It is made of Malbec which gives it intense fruity components with a little bit of structure.
The end of September is here as is the departure of our intern, Edgar Guignard, on Monday. Edgar hails from Cognac, France where his family has a vineyard, winery and distillery. As many of you know, we have a longstanding internship program; it began in 1985 when a friend of a friend asked me if we would host a French enology student. As former interns in Burgundy, France, Sarah and I understood how an internship could inspire and influence young people, so it was easy for us to say “yes!”. Edgar is our 37th intern.
We are lucky to be the experimentation ground for our friend and budding photographer Chris Bingham. Over the past years, Chris has been honing his photography skills here at Hafner Vineyard whether it be out in the vineyard during Harvest or in the cellar for bottling or on the hillsides in the midst of fires. Last Harvest, Chris took his photography experiment here to a new level by focusing on “stop motion photography” during the post-fermentation draining of Cabernet. The images are evocative and dramatic. We wanted to share the photos with you and give you a little peak into this artist’s life.
