Healdsburg, Calif. (October 13, 2020) – Theresa Heredia of Gary Farrell Winery has been nominated as Winemaker of the Year by Wine Enthusiast Magazine for its annual Wine Star Awards. She was one of five winemakers nominated for the award, which the magazine announced on October 13.
Theresa Heredia has been winemaker for Gary Farrell Winery in the Russian River Valley since 2012. Her wines are regularly among the highest scoring wines in Wine Enthusiast, and in 2017 her Gary Farrell 2015 Russian River Selection Chardonnay was selected by the magazine as the #1 wine for the year in “The Enthusiast 100” annual report of the top wines. Her winemaking career includes an early stint in Burgundy and work at top wineries in the Napa Valley and Sonoma County. She was a Ph.D. candidate in chemistry with an emphasis on enology at U.C. Davis, before leaving to follow her calling as a hands-on winemaker.
Winners of the Wine Star Awards will be announced on winemag.com November 11 and will appear in the special “Best of Year” December 31 issue.
Gary Farrell Winery was founded in 1982 by Gary Farrell, who was a pioneer in the Russian River Valley wine region. For more than 30 years, Gary Farrell Winery has crafted small-lot artisan wines that capture the balance and stylistic elegance of some of the finest vineyard sites in the region. Farrell sold the winery in 2004, and today the winery is owned by Bill Price, the managing partner of Kistler Vineyard and owner of Three Sticks and The Adobe, Lutum and the famed Durell and Gap’s Crown vineyards; and a group of investors including Pete Scott, the former CFO of Beringer Wine Estates; and Walt Klenz; former president and CEO of Beringer Wine Estates. Winemaker Theresa Heredia is nurturing Gary Farrell’s legacy of producing small lots of Burgundian-styled, varietally expressive and regionally distinctive Russian River Valley Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.
Additional information on the winery is at www.garyfarrellwinery.com. Additional information on the Wine Star Awards is at www.winemag.com/category/articles/wine-star-awards/.