I am still amazed at the work that goes into a bottle of wine. Just think of it, in order for a Selene wine lover to open and enjoy a bottle of our wine, a lot of dedicated people have to do their jobs first. Growers/Vineyards: They say it starts in the vineyard, no exception [...]

As you recall, Mia and I had fun designing a Capsule for the Dead Fred package. We chose this design as our new Capsule. (There are two parts to a capsule, the ‘skirt’ and the ‘top’.) There was a reason for every choice we made in this design. 1. We had the skirt of the [...]

So we covered ‘Stock Capsules’ in Part One, but as you will see, Custom capsules are a whole different animal. It all started when Mia and I wanted to design custom capsules for the Selene Dead Fred Cabernet Sauvignon, and (if we were successful) the Selene Chesler Wine. We were faced with a similarity problem [...]

If I’ve learned anything, I’ve learned that capsules are an important part of any wine package. For Mia, and her brand, Selene, it’s very important. There isn’t a bottle of wine that we open that she’s not looking at (examining) the whole package. Sometimes she comments on the bottle, the label, the closure, or the [...]

The full ‘Harvest’ Moon on October 3rd was beautiful! We sat outside and watched it rise. On October 6th, we picked the Dead Fred Cabernet down in Coombsville. We have 4.7 tons of Dead Fred resting in tank. It’s great this year! This is a picture of Mia and Chris Benz, the production manager at [...]

Today we brought in just under 3 tons of Merlot from Frediani Vineyards up in Calistoga. Mia was up and out before daylight to get up to Calistoga and watch the pick. She also had some other vineyards to walk through and sample before heading to the winery for the processing of the Merlot. You [...]

Today is Sunday, which means we aren’t picking, but we are tasting. We rode over to the winery on our motorcycles to taste all the fermentors and see how everything is coming along. It’s a treat to ride during harvest, as we don’t usually get the time to ride, and even if we get a [...]

Mia was up bright and early yesterday for the first pick of reds. She was up at Bressler Vineyards for their Cabernet Franc and Merlot picking. The fruit came in really clean and it’s all in a tank soaking away. Mia sampled the Bressler Petit Verdot (24.6 brix) and the Cabernet (24.4 brix) while she [...]

Mia and I went out to Frediani Vineyards today to walk through the Merlot vineyard. We are picking the Cabernet Franc on Friday, September 25, and wanted to see if the Merlot was going to be ready to pick at the same time. The Merlot has been dragging it’s feet, so the sugars aren’t moving. [...]

Ah, it seems like just yesterday that I talked Mia into getting a blackberry. (It’s been almost two years.) It’s been really good for her to have since she travels and is out in the vineyards, and at the winery, more than at a desk. Recently, I drug her to the store to get the [...]