Martinelli Winery

The Martinelli family has been growing grapes and making wine in Sonoma County since the 1880s. The Martinelli family produces small lots of Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Syrah, and Zinfandel produced from estate grown grapes. These vineyards are meticulously farmed by Lee Martinelli Sr., and his two sons, Lee, Jr. and George, continuing five generations of the proud family legacy of care-taking the land.

Helen Turley helped shape the Martinelli vineyards and winemaking style during her tenure as consulting winemaker from 1992 to 2010. The Martinelli‘s worked with Helen from beginning to end; analyzing soil samples, choosing rootstocks, varietals and clones that were best suited to a particular growing site, employing seasonal primping and pruning in the field, and creating the final blends for the finished wine. Bryan Kvamme was hired in 1996 as assistant winemaker and eventually took over the reins as winemaker for Martinelli in 2007.

The Martinelli vineyards are located in Russian River Valley, Green Valley of Russian River, and Sonoma Coast Appellations. The terroir of each vineyard is what creates the “personality” of each wine and showcases the full range of diversity between them. All of the vineyards are heavily thinned to yield between one to three tons of fruit per acre. At harvest time the grapes are hand selected according to taste and are fermented with wild yeast in French oak barrels. The wines are minimally handled with true handcrafted artistry; they are neither hot nor cold stabilized, and are unfined and unfiltered.