Vineyards & Growers

sequitur vineyard

This vineyard, hidden amidst the trees on the Ribbon Ridge, was planted on Marine Sedimentary soils in 2012 and 2013 by Beaux Freres founder, Mike Etzel and his wife, Carey Critchlow. At 425 feet elevation, the site is contiguous to Beaux Freres’s Upper Terrace and hosts a list of unique clones: Chalone, Mt. Eden, Rochioli, Musigny, Pommard, Wadensvil, 667, 777, 943, M100….

We feel honored to have been offered this fruit by Mike and Carey because outside of the Etzel family projects, only Walter Scott and Hundred Suns receive fruit from this extraordinary site. More importantly, after Grant’s 9 years at Beaux Freres, Mike and Carey feel like family to us, and we love to stay connected to them through this vineyard.

bednarik vineyard

The Bednarik vineyard sits on a majestic hill in the cool Coast Range outside of Cherry Grove. The 6 acre, own-rooted vineyard was planted at 350 elevation on a south/southwest exposure to Pommard and Wadensvil in 1988 by William Bednarik. When Grant’s friends, the Mora brothers, took over the site in 2016, they called him to ask him to take a look. On the first visit, Grant immediately saw the potential of this site-a cooler nature to balance oncoming warmer vintages, older vines, and a perfect aspect. With the Mora’s on board to take the vineyard organic, Grant knew we had to jump. Bednarik has now become a bedrock site for Hundred Suns.

hundred suns estate - Breaker vineyard

In the summer of 2018 we bought a perfect house in the Eola-Amity Hills AVA sitting atop Walnut Hill Road and surrounded by this 4 acre vineyard. On the hillside, this site is known as “the Old Vines,” but to our kids it is their new backyard. We brought in our first fruit from the site during the harvest of 2018, so look for a special inaugural single vineyard release in 2020.

First planted in 1972 by Richard Zielinski our vineyard sits at 545-590 feet with a slight southeast exposure.  The vineyard soils are formed from weathered basalt. To the north the soils are predominantly Nekia, moderately deep silty clay soils laying on a layer of basalt bedrock.  The southern portion is predominantly Gelderman soil series which has much thinner topsoils with rocks and cobbles strewn throughout the rows. The western half of the vineyard was originally planted to Draper clone Chardonnay but later grafted to 777 clone of Pinot Noir and the eastern half to the Pommard clone of Pinot Noir - all original roots.   The vines are old and show their age, but with organic farming practices, paying special attention to rebuilding the soils, and severe pruning we hope to coax new life out of this truly special piece of land.