Meet Lamar Engel | Advanced Sommelier, Creative Director & Experience Producer for the Wine Militia

We had the good fortune of connecting with Lamar Engel and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Lamar, what led you to pursuing a creative path professionally?
I found early on in my wine career that creating memorable experiences for people was what made me happy. The sentiment that art reflects life rings true for me in that the idea of curating special detailed sensorial moments however small or large with guests at my events often leads to deep nostalgia. I began to discover that the process of providing a hands on experience draws out feelings similar to thumbing through records in a vinyl shop, pulling out a familiar record, dropping the needle on it and just sitting with it. Using the analogy of vinyl music, by listening to the whole album, not just the popular tracks, it really opens up creative openness to listening for something yet to be discovered. This is the type of nostalgic creativity is what I absolutely adore and strive to include in everything I touch and share with guests- including wine experiences.

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
I operate a little business called The Wine Militia which is an experience and event company with focus on beverage activities and education- in particular wine & mixology. We produce ticketed events for public as well as corporate group & private functions. Some of the favorite experiences that are now requested are in fact a Vinyl & Wine Tasting experience we call ‘Sip & Spin’ as well as others from Team Blind Wine Tastings and Wine Blending Experiences to overly intricate ways in approaching other wine tasting activities.

The way it all started was that I had been working and managing businesses in the wine industry (wineries, tasting rooms, restaurants, etc) in the early 2000’s and noticed an educational need in the ‘market’. There was more than one occasion that was helped catalyst and catapult my intent when I would often experience well heeled and affluent leaders in the wine industry brow beat and berate guests as well as employees that would ask simple questions looking for answers surrounding wine. Like they should all know better. How were they to know without being taught? Why were they being made to feel that way?

What I didn’t realize was that this was considered ‘normal’ and ‘acceptable’ within the wine industry to treat people this way and was common for people in higher positional posture to treat other people that way. I found myself very much on the outskirts of this behavior battling for recognition with these various associations and organizations and was a little ashamed to even be in positions that would promote this ‘better-than-thou’ mentality. I had to do something to break out of it but it required a revolutionary way of thinking and non-passive action. I was always drawn to the marginalized and misfit groups on the fringe of various communities and have challenged myself to begin thinking in terms of the way people wanted to be interacted with; thinking out-of-the box, trying to break the norm.

At the time I had been working for one of the most creative individuals in film & wine who owned a winery and vineyard in Napa Valley, Mr. Francis Ford Coppola. I was fortunate to work closely with the Coppola family in various projects through wine so those moments when creatives hear other iconic creatives monologue in everyday life – was literally a bell that would ring in my head every day working for the Coppola family businesses.

Francis had this quarterly magazine which was a celebration of art, scripts, stories and photography called Zoetrope: All-Story that would feature a cover artist every quarter. Besides managing the wine programs for the family and the winery, it was well within our purview to also consider creating some sort of awareness towards this magazine. I was so blown away by how uninterested my affiliated colleagues in leadership were towards supporting or promoting efforts to celebrate this collection of art that was a direct peripheral tie to what we do in wine. No one got it.

I remember where I was reading this magazine for the first time outside of the winery chateau in Rutherford, California overlooking a vineyard fountain with this historical megalithic building built in the 1800’s just beyond me and thinking ‘Is anyone connecting how these expressions of art and wine can live together?” After I made the determination that despite what my leadership thought, I would deliver something that would cause awareness to this collection of art within a magazine.

Let me tell you, planning an entire production without anyone in my day -to-day operation knowing was close to impossible. Just before the next release of the Zoetrope: All Story magazine was to come out, I reached out to the publisher through our company directory to try and get my hands on at least a digital version of what the contents were. They came through and before long I was already skimming the pages and analyzing the art to see what we could do to create an event around the concepts. I enlisted the help of some outside friends in the acting community who were eager to do anything it took to create this underground one day concept. The brainstorming sessions were what I lived for as they were completely electric and hilarious as we would pull things out of our hat that were insanity.

After the creative dust settled, we managed to put together a fully immersive guest experience with wine tasting throughout the winery chateau. In one of the wine salons guests would stumble upon a room adorned with paper strewn desks and multitudes of crumpled up paper balls on the floor while making their way around a maze bookshelves and a shelves of dusty bottles only to find an actor portraying a writer at a typewriter. The writer was frantically typing, smoking a cigarette, and sipping on espresso, (yep we knew it was illegal) appearing to be in a writers block. Guests were then engaged and invited by the actor to sit down at a series of other typewriters to help the writer with a creative conscious flow of ideas for a short story. After the guests were applauded by their musings, papers pulled out of typewriters as they were escorted to another part of the winery where a 1940’s radio soundstage was well underway by other actors playing like a an old fashioned radio show featuring sound effects that guests could visually watch being created while listening to a story. Literally movies for their ears.

Incorporating wine woven throughout not only the story but the entire program in clever ways allowed people to see that these two worlds do exist and should. That day Mr. Coppola came with his wife Eleanor and son Roman. To say that we were nervous was an understatement. I was in the team of voice actors at the soundstage and refused to take my eyes off of him to search for any expression of gratitude. What transpired after the program was a fever dream of conversations with the family. It started the first push of the domino in my world as he attended more of these creative programs later blessing the whole of it all becoming more involved and we realized that these type of activations belonged in the winery but more than that – belonged outside the winery walls. I continued to work for the Coppolas as we incubated the concepts to do more creative ventures in more than one location. This sparked endless irreverence for what has been done in the industry and allowed me to be at the front of a wine industry disruption. Before that, no one was thinking about curating unique wine tastings outside of wineries or tasting rooms, it just wasn’t happening.

We literally started welcoming an army of wine misfits that felt like they belonged in our little creative wine circle and wine tasting groups. I think the term ‘army’ stuck when we would show up to events dressed in prohibition style military overcoats and garments, carrying old 40’s luggage pieces that carried our wine tools, etc. Someone named us the ‘wine mafia’ but we were more than that, we were for the people by the people. I think that is where the ‘militia’ came from. It is a very aggressive term in current affairs these days, however, if we look at notable moments in our own nations history (War of 1812 – The Battle of New Orleans) we can see the positive revolutionary impact that was represented the liberation of marginalized even then. We resonate with that.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
So because of my background being a musician, when I think of Los Angeles, think Rock & Roll. I think I would start by going to SIR Studios on sunset and call my friend Ron who would let us in and rent a stage and go into their guitar amplifier room, pick out any amp (they have 100’s), and plug a guitar in to play. To a musician, this is candy in a candy store.
After that we would go to Nivessa Vinyl Records on Hollywood Blvd to dig through some classics and see if we could find some golden treasures there to spin later. Working up an appetite we would have to head over to Canter’s Deli to get a proper Pastrami Reuben and reminisce over signing my first record deal there at one of the deli tables.
After this we would make our way through a scenic part of L.A. through Laurel Canyon and end up in Studio City to see my sommelier friend Rebecca who runs Vintage Wine + Eats where we would throw ourselves at the mercy of her latest finds to pour for us and wax poetic on what wines we should pair to the vinyl albums we would had purchased earlier that day. I think after that as the sun sets we are heading over to Hollywood Forever Cemetery to pay tribute to legends Johnny Ramone and Chris Cornell et al and just walk the grounds. It is a gorgeous place and there are so many iconic legends to reflect on before heading out. In true Hollywood style we would then head over to the Rainbow Bar & Grill to grab some grub, drinks and find ourselves watching some live music.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
Boy, there are way too many people that deserve recognition!
I will say that the one constant person in my life that deserves so much recognition is my wife and best friend Sonja who runs our sister marketing company, Militia Consulting. I tend to look at our working relationship a little bit like Bonnie & Clyde in the creative space as we tend to find ourselves breaking rules in strategy concepts when asked to ‘deliver different’ for clients. Not only does she create alongside me with many of our pursuits, she encourages me to find that arena to grind my fledgling ideas and develop creatively. Allowances are huge to creatives. Stifling and smothering creative flames was a toxic path we had experienced in other peer and professional groups/companies – so to understand each other and allow graces is important within our little circle.

I think I would be also remiss to not mention that my father, Walter Engel; he definitely is to be recognized. He may never know the impact he actually had on my creative exploits nor would he ever take any credit of his own, but he had a huge impact on my journey. I lovingly call my dad ‘the Vicar’ as he has a timeless style that one only sees in old movies. Now retired man of the cloth, my father was a different kind of communicator as he had no fear presenting to giant groups of people through dynamic story telling; I learned everything I know in that regards from him. He also taught me the art of being detailed oriented and organized. I have fond memories of my father creating vignettes and special moments of nostalgia for guests during various Holidays (especially Christmas) in the church and was always blown away about how he thought of everything – every small detail was filled with intent to make someone feel and think a certain way. He was fairly strict and sometimes harsh with me when I would help him set up and prepare for those experiential candlelight evenings for guests but I realized and learned later on that it was because these details mattered. From old kerosene lanterns to the texture of ribbon and wax seals adorning programs, not one detail was overlooked.

Website: https://www.thewinemilitia.com

Instagram: @winemilitia

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/winemilitia

Image Credits
Craft & Cluster