Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Vinous
Shimmering ruby. A highly perfumed bouquet evokes fresh red and blue fruits, candied flowers and exotic spices, and a hint of cola emerges with air. Juicy and energetic in the mouth, offering appealingly sweet black raspberry and boysenberry flavors sharpened by a spicy flourish. Finishes very long and lively, with sneaky tannins and resonating florality. 43% new oak.
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Wine Enthusiast
Richly fruity with a lush mix of blackberry and savory herbs, this is a forward, well-structured wine that brings a hint of iron ore. A whiff of smoke trails through the finish, along with some stiffer tannins. It was aged 15 months in 43% new French oak and the rest once filled.
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Wine Spectator
A lovely, generous wine with vibrant cherry blossom and rose petal aromas opening to refined raspberry and savory spice flavors that build tension toward medium-grained tannins.
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James Suckling
The dark herbs and woody spices are dialed up nicely on the nose with blueberries and cherries sitting pure in the glass. The palate has a subtly smoky edge with a sweetly spicy core of ripe-cherry flavor.
Lemelson Vineyards began as a dream to create a winery grounded in nature, inspired by tradition in winemaking, and driven by innovation in technology. From the beginning, organic farming was at the core of that vision. Through organic viticulture and gravity-flow production, Lemelson crafts estate-grown Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris, Chardonnay, and Riesling that honor Oregon’s Willamette Valley.
Founder Eric Lemelson planted his first organically farmed vineyard in Yamhill County in 1995. Realizing that he loved the work involved in growing wine grapes, two years later he planted an additional 30 acres of Pinot noir and began planning the construction of a gravity-flow winery. Sustainability and organic practices were guiding principles from the start, both in the vineyards and in the winery, which was ultimately constructed using recycled and renewable materials. The intention was building something that would not only serve consumers but also the longevity of their pristine home state of Oregon.
Their commitment to organic farming and sustainability extends to all facets of winery life and ensures that all living components, be they land, vine, or human, are well cared for. It’s their belief that the glass you’re enjoying at home starts before vines were ever planted. The process from planting to drinking must be nurtured at all steps.
When you drink Lemelson wine, you are not only drinking an elegant, expressive Willamette Valley wine, you’re taking part in their journey to protect the earth for generations to come, and they thank you for that.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Home of the first Pinot noir vineyard of the Willamette Valley, planted by David Lett of Eyrie Vineyard in 1966, today the Dundee Hills AVA remains the most densely planted AVA in the valley (and state). To its north sits the Chehalem Valley and to its south, runs the Willamette River. Within the region’s 12,500 acres, about 1,700 are planted to vine on predominantly basalt-based, volcanic, Jory soil.