Flatiron Wines & Spirits SF

It’s not just great value that draws us to the Edges of Burgundy. It’s also because it’s in and around the Edges that vignerons feel that they can experiment. What wine producer wants to take a chance on a zero sulfur Clos de Beze? If it doesn’t work out, you are out a lot of revenue. That’s one reason that natural winemaking is so much more popular in Beaujolais or the Loire. Or on the Edges of Burgundy.

Sonoe Hirabayashi group up in Nagano, Japan. Her family made sake, fermented soy sauce, and miso, and grew apples. She came to California to study wine, completed a number of internships at wineries around the world (Ted Lemon, Ostertag, etc.), and then settled down here to make Californian wine. She calls her winery “Six Cloves” – the name that her Japanese ancestors called their own business.

When Pauline and Géraud Fromont founded their Domaine des Marnes Blanches deep in the south of the Jura, the region (Sud Revermont) wasn't on anyone's radar. It was 2006, the husband and wife were fresh out of wine school, and they were happy to be able to come home to the Jura and build something together. Since then, so much has changed. The Jura blew up. Ganevat (from the same region) became a star and then a superstar, Labet and Miroir (likewise neighbors) became culty and then cultier. The Natural Wines of Overnoy Puffeney became legendary and spearheaded the whole movement.