Meet Garrett York | Winemaker

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

Hi Garrett, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
We love wine, and we like to work with our hands, so we thought the best way to get to know wine better was to make it. Our short term goal is to spend 10 years trying to make as many different styles from as many varieties, soils, aspects, and altitudes possible to see what is unique about southern California, a region that has lost our tradition and has no real benchmarks.

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?
The Herrmanns and the Yorks are families who like to build things with our hands. When, over a decade ago, we wanted to indulge our growing interest in wine, the natural means to explore it was to make it. We learned two things that set the business in motion and have sustained us ever since: (1) Wine is most compelling because of where it comes from, and (2) The Inland Empire of southern California has a rich, if lost, history of winegrowing and winemaking. There are periodicals, old labels, and grandchildren who can tell us parts of the story, but only two wineries still exists from those days, so the connection to that past has largely been severed. Our goal has become to spend the first decade of our careers exploring the history, soils, regions, exposures, varieties, elevations, and climates of this place, through both old and brand-new vines, with the goal of figuring out what our benchmarks can be. What can this place make with excellence? Building a business on this sort of exploration has presented some difficulties because we’ve denied ourselves winemaking tools that could obscure a clear expression of the fruit, but may make winemaking safer. We’ve also limited the tools of farming that can make that practice easier. Our theory, which we share with many thousands across the world, is that healthy soils and plants along with simple winemaking practices give the winegrower and maker the best chance at making a wine of place. Because we don’t have these tools, the wines are more widely varied in texture, flavor, and aroma. We’re taking some swings, we’re trying new things. We’re trying to build our own traditions. But as the old saying goes, a tradition is just an innovation that worked.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Redlands has some interesting things to check out, but it’s its proximity to some other wonderful places that make it worth visiting as well. We have a trio of business friends who are great and are worth traveling to check out. Lucid Coffee, Happy Mediums Deli and Sandwiches, and Village Bread bakery. They are all located within the same bizarre German-inspired shopping center off the 10 freeway on the way to the low desert. No visit to the Inland Empire would be complete without popping out to the desert and going up the Areal Tramway above Palm Springs to the top of Mount San Jacinto. Visiting the Living Desert is also a great trip. You can go for a paddle around Big Bear Lake and pop into our friend’s bottle shop, Little Bear, in Skyforest, located on HWY 18. The Redlands Oyster Cult is a great place to dine in Redlands in the evenings. Great cocktails and the best wine list in town. There are also half a dozen lovely parks around Redlands and Yucaipa that are calm with lovely views of the San Bernardino Mountains (Prospect, Smiley, Ford, Caroline, Sylvain, Yucaipa Regional, Oak Glen Preserve). Lot 24 Olive Oil is top tier olive oil farmed and made locally. Oak Glen has a few apple farms (including Stone Soup) that offer apple picking, cider, and other autumnal treats. There’s lots of hiking in the San Bernardino Mountains as well as off road trails off the HWY 38. Uptown Wine Merchant is another wine place worth stopping into. Our friend’s Ben runs it and has something for everyone. Truly. But the best thing to do is to make friends with someone and have dinner at their place. Sit in their back yard as the sun is setting over the San Gabriel Mountains and find yourself saying over and over again, “I had no idea the Inland Empire was like this.” Maybe you’ll even start thinking things like, “maybe there’s something worthwhile about everywhere.”

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
Herrmann York is three families making wine. Every member of our immediate and extended families deserves credit for everything we make. These are the hands and feet that make the wine. We also do this primarily for the Inland Empire, where many, many people of extraordinary vision live, work, create, and support one another. We owe them the clearest, most compelling wine this region can produce—one that doesn’t simply ape another tradition or regional style, but establishes our own of which we can be proud.

Website: https://herrmannyork.com

Instagram: @herrmannyorkwine

Image Credits
Garrett York