Small Vines Wines

Paul Sloan believes that the world’s best wines are grown, not made. So his vineyards are unlike any other.

Sloan specializes in ultra-high density plantings. Rows are just 4 feet apart, rather than 8 to 12 as is the norm in California. And grapevines are just 3 to 4 feet apart. When vines growing in soils of low to moderate vigor (such as that found in their vineyards in Sonoma) have to compete for resources, they produce fewer, smaller berries. Why is this a good thing, you ask? Because the flavor is concentrated in those berries. Hence Small Vines Wines’ slogan: The smaller the vine, the better the wine.™

The inspiration for this style of grape growing comes from Burgundy, birthplace of world-famous Pinot Noirs and Chardonnays. Sloan learned about Pinot Noir working first as a busboy at the Kenwood Restaurant in high school and later as a server. He took a position at the nationally acclaimed John Ash Restaurant outside Santa Rosa in the early 1990s and worked his way up to wine steward. An epiphany with a rare Burgundy there led him on a quest to re-create the viticulture practices in California, launching Small Vines Viticulture in 1998.

In the first years he and his wife, Kathryn, worked for landowners selling their grapes to Sonoma Coast Vineyards, including Paul Hobbs, DuMol, Benovia, Red Car, Freeman, Sojourn, Hunter- Chasseur, B. Kosuge, Gros Ventre, Breggo and Kutch. They still farm for a few of those wineries today.

It was always his dream, however, to make estate-grown wines. “The only design flaw was we were young and landless and needed a way to make a living until we could get the estate,” Sloan says. “We created a plan to plant and manage vineyards until we could afford to lease them back from the landowners and eventually buy our own.” Small Vines first wine, 2005 Russian River Pinot Noir, was released in fall 2007.

It’s a family-owned business. Paul and Kathryn are the chief cooks and bottle washers, farmers, winemakers, customer service and sales team. The Sloans live on Small Vines Estate near Sebastopol, where they grow Pinot Noir, Chardonnay. Every wine they make is from a vineyard that they’ve planted in their high-density style. In addition to their Small Vines Estate, they grow grapes at Old Mill Vineyard in the heart of the Green Valley, on Green Hill Road. MK Vineyard spans a ridge above the town of Occidental. And Baranoff sits high above the Laguna De Santa Rosa. They’re farming organically and even implementing biodynamic practices in some of their vineyards.

They start with meticulous Grand Cru standards of only 10 shoots per meter, 1.5 to 2 lbs. per vine. “Low yields are crucial, especially for Pinot Noir,” Sloan says. “Each plant is farmed individually, and decisions are made vine by vine. We hope to spend more time in the vineyard and therefore less time in the winery.”