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Points of view. Not points. Points of View. Not Points. Grape Collective launched in 2013 to offer compelling stories about wines and the people who make them.

Our columnists include experienced wine journalists like Dorothy Gaiter, John Brecher and Monty Waldin. But Grape Collective isn’t just another wine magazine stuffed with plaudits and point scores. We take a different tack. Our writers choose the wineries, winemakers, regions, and wines they're driven to write about, telling us why each wine matters. And then we source those wines to make them easier to buy and try. It’s a new model, but one that gives writers latitude and readers options. We hope you like it. Facebook updates by Christopher Barnes.

09/04/2026

FROM TINTO PESQUERA TO A NEW GENERATION

In 1972 Alejandro Fernández and Esperanza Rivera planted Tempranillo in the village of Pesquera de Duero and named the wine after it. First vintage 1975. The Ribera del Duero DO did not exist until 1982. In the early 1980s Robert Parker called it “the Spanish Pétrus” and the region was on the map.

Lisa Denning talked with sisters MªCruz and Olga Fernández Rivera of Familia Fernández Rivera.

FOUR ESTATES: Tinto Pesquera and Condado de Haza in Ribera del Duero, Dehesa La Granja in Zamora, El Vínculo in Castilla-La Mancha.

FIRST TO GO 100%: “For our family, Tempranillo is the winery’s true identity. Always 100%, never blends.”

ORGANIC IN ONE YEAR: inspectors found no chemical residue in the soil. The family had farmed that way for decades. Dehesa La Granja runs cover crops, olive trees, chickpeas, cattle and sheep fed on what the estate grows.

FROST, NOT HEAT: pruning moved later, so budbreak comes later and the vines duck the May frosts.

TWO WHITES: Alejairén, 100% Airén from 90 year old vines in sand phylloxera never reached, named for their father Alejandro. And Pesquera Albillo Mayor, Ribera’s nearly forgotten white, still scattered among the old Tempranillo.

Full interview at the link in bio. Interview by Lisa Denning for Grape Collective - Points of View, Not Points

Airen AlbilloMayor WomenInWine OldVines GrapeCollective DrinkSpanish

08/24/2026

When does a great wine reach its peak?
The honest answer is: no one knows for sure. Like people, every bottle ages differently, shaped by its vintage, producer, storage, and individual history.
To celebrate their birthdays Dorothy Gaiter John Brecher opened two historic Barolos at Keens Steakhouse : a 1989 Ceretto Zonchera and a 1990 Massolino - Azienda Agricola Vigna Rionda Vigna Rionda, chosen to honor the birth years of their daughters, Media and Zoë, and their son-in-law, José.
Both wines had been stored for years, and opening them was a delicate operation. Their fragile corks required a Durand, handled expertly by the restaurant’s server.
The 1989 Ceretto immediately filled the room with aromas of dried rose petals, black cherries, cedar, earth, and mature tannins. It was elegant, fresh, and beautifully alive.
The 1990 Massolino was more restrained at first, with notes of mushrooms, forest floor, herbs, spice, and tar. With time, it opened and revealed more fruit, though it remained leaner and more austere than the Ceretto
The wines reflected their origins: La Morra’s fragrance and softness in the 1989, and Serralunga d’Alba’s muscular structure in the 1990.
Were they both at their absolute best?
Read “Barolo and Babies: The Secret to Discovering When They’ll Peak” by Dorothy Gaiter John Brecher Grape Collective - Points of View, Not Points 🔗 in bio.
Photo credit: José Ginarte
WineStories WineAndFood WineEducation WineTasting Ceretto Massolino VignaRionda KeensSteakhouse OpenThatBottleNight OTBN WineMemories DottieAndJohn

08/17/2026

From wine distribution to estate winemaking: Chris Underwood’s next chapter is rooted in the Russian River Valley.
After leading Young’s Market Company and helping guide its sale to RNDC, Underwood turned toward a - crafting wines with a sense of place. Together with winemaker Vance Rose, he began at Moon Dust Vineyard in Sebastopol Hills, drawn to its cool-climate setting, Goldridge “moon dust” soils, and mature Chardonnay and Pinot Noir vines.
That early project, Jonive, became the learning ground. In 2025, that vision found its home at the former Arista Winery estate on Westside Road, is now reborn as Harper’s Rest.
Named for Reuben Harper, a nineteenth-century hops farmer buried beneath a Bay Laurel tree among the vines, Harper’s Rest is focused on Russian River Valley Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.
With Vance Rose, Michael Ortiz, Dustin Durfee, and consulting winemaker Matt Courtney shaping the wines, Harper’s Rest is still evolving.
🍷
Harper’s Rest Winery Chris Underwood Lilly Vance Rose
WestsideRoad PinotNoir Chardonnay WineCountry SonomaWine

08/11/2026

Blind tasting doesn’t have to be intimidating, competitive, or reserved for people who can identify a vintage from across the room. It can be one of wine’s great pleasures: a way to slow down, compare, pay attention—and discover what is really in your glass when the label is out of sight.
‘s recently received Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignons offered the perfect excuse. Bagged, numbered, and tasted without tech sheets or expectations, the wines revealed entirely different personalities: bright cherries and “rocks,” chocolate-covered cherries, eucalyptus and tannin, velvet and mocha, blackberries.
Then came the second-day surprise.
After a night in the cooler, still blind, one wine had transformed into something more lively, peppery, layered, elegant, and compelling with every return to the glass. Another became the picture of a “stately Cabernet” - seamless, focused, beautiful, and complete.

It is a reminder that, amid changing fashions and increasingly powerful Napa styles, classic producers still have something profound to say, especially when their wines balance ripeness with freshness, oak with fruit, and richness with the ability to make you want another sip.
And perhaps the real winner was not a bottle at all. It was the tasting itself. Spottswoode Estate Chappellet Vineyard & Winery
Read the column 🔗 in bio grapecollective.com. 🍷
WineWriting WineLovers FineWine Chappellet PritchardHill StHelena BordeauxBlend DrinkBetter WineEducation WineCulture OpenThatBottleNight

08/04/2026

Lighting round ⚡️Q&A with limnad_wine winemaker Nancy Irlan! 🍷✨
Lisa Denning of Grape Collective - Points of View, Not Points sits down with Nancy for a rapid-fire Q&A on the places and icons that shape her craft.
Inside this quick hit:
📍 The wine region that influenced her style the most
✈️ The ultimate bucket-list wine region she’s dying to visit
🥂 The historical figure she’d love to share a bottle with
👇
🔗 Tap the link in bio for the full interview on Grape Collective.
InstaWine WineQandA Viticulture WineCommunity CellarTalk 🙏 Grossberg/Kopman Selections for representing these great wines

08/03/2026

Sparkling wine is the original Finger Lakes story. The first vineyards went in during the 1820s, and by the 1860s the region was producing roughly two-thirds of all the sparkling wine made in the United States. Then phylloxera arrived, Prohibition finished the job, and tastes moved on. Nancy Irelan thinks that history is worth reclaiming.

Irelan has been growing grapes and making wine on Seneca Lake for more than two decades. The first Pinot Noir she picked from her own vineyard, back in 2006, went into sparkling wine, and she hasn’t turned back since. In 2025 she launched Limnad, an independent label devoted entirely to bubbles: four traditional method sparklers and two pét-nats, all from Finger Lakes fruit. Lisa Denning spoke with Irelan about the label, the region’s sparkling revival, and why she believes the Finger Lakes’ future is full of bubbles. 🔗 in bio. Read more and watch the 🎥 grapecollective.com

07/28/2026

BYOB Rules: Why the Debate Is So Heated Right Now
Dorothy Gaiter John Brecher recently happened into a little Indian place in Manhattan with a dreadful wine list, outstanding food, and four words at the bottom of the menu: “Corkage: $15.” They can’t wait to go back.

Something has shifted lately. After spending only a few minutes on the subject on Laurie Forster’s podcast The Sipping Point 🥂 the feedback hasn’t stopped. Their guess is that the economy is doing most of the work. Diners are recoiling at restaurant markups and want every night out to count. Restaurants are having a hard time of it as they chose their lists for a reason, they pay for storage, stemware, service and, in fine dining, a wine director’s salary, and they’ve been burned by guests who grab something cheap at the corner shop on the way in.

BYOB, handled well on both sides, is a win for everybody. Some of what they suggest -

Never bring a bottle that’s on the list. If the list isn’t online, call.

Skip the grocery store run. It doesn’t have to be a first growth from your birth year; it should be personal. For a neighborhood trattoria they brought a David & Nadia Grenache Noir, because they’d met Nadia Sadie in Stellenbosch, and because the birthday guest had just started a job under a supervisor named Nadia.

Know the fee first. In New York, $35 to $45 is common.

And one for the restaurants: if you say you welcome BYOB, don’t swap the good stemware for industrial glassware when the bottle comes out of the bag.

More BYOB insight in the full piece at grapecollective.com 🔗 link in bio.

07/21/2026

Justin Willett: Defining the Potential of Santa Barbara by .a.wine.journal

Willett grew up in the area with no winemakers in the family, learned the subject waiting tables in Los Angeles, and came home when he realized world-class Pinot Noir and Chardonnay were being grown just over the hill. He made his first barrels for in 2005. Twenty-one years on, Tyler is known for wines built on freshness and balance rather than power and organically farmed, native fermentation, nothing added but a touch of sulfur.

He now owns Mae, named for his wife, and Fiddlesticks, the vineyard Kathy Joseph planted in the late ‘90s across the road from Sanford & Benedict - the same site that gave him his very first grapes. Alongside Tyler there’s Lieu Dit for Loire varieties, Ad Ripa for Happy Canyon Cabernet, and a growing run of traditional method sparkling wine that began with a chance tasting with Cédric Bouchard.

On style he’s unsentimental: not chasing ripeness, not chasing points. He jokes that his Cabernets aren’t your dad’s, they’re your grandparents’. On what comes next, at 45 and with another twenty vintages in front of him, he says he has no idea and that he embraces the uncertainty.
Read the full interview at grapecollective.com 🔗in bio

07/20/2026

I just sent "Loire on Long Island by Dottie & John + Argentina Football & Malbec + Tyler Winery in Santa Barbara" to my subscribers. Be sure to get on my list to get the next one straight to your inbox.

07/16/2026

🍷and ⚽️are 🇦🇷 two great passions so we asked the family to pair the national team with wine. ? The old-vine Malbec Argentino. Emiliano Martínez? A spicy, shootout-ready Cabernet Franc. and more get their match too. Full interview with and Dante Catena at grapecollective.com.

Messi Catena

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