New Houston Winery to open in 2016 (April Fools)

Update: Wouldn’t you know it. I got home and all the pots with vines are gone!!! Guess we’ll have to postpone our venture and try again next year on April 1st. Note that April 1st is April Fool’s Day as this was just a joke. Actually it would be pretty cool to someday have a winery or other venture into the wine industry, and the next time anything is announced it will be for real. Sorry to those who thought this was real.

We have exciting news! In 2016, we will be opening a brand new winery in Houston offering estate only wines! The growth of the number of Texas wineries has risen and we estimate by 2016, we will be around the 425th winery in Texas.

As mentioned in a previous blog post, we helped Bernhardt Winery prune their vineyard and we came home with 48 Blanc du Bois cuttings. We were not sure if they would grow but they have done wonderfully! In fact if you look closely at the photos, you can almost see the first baby grapes already arriving.

Plans have hatched quickly and since it takes three years to get quality wine making grapes, 2016 will be when the grapes will be ready and the wine will be available at year’s end. We will soon be transplanting the vines from the pots into a new vineyard area in our backyard. Thankfully we have enough room which will handle the vines. We are also looking into planting Lenoir vines this year to supplement the grapes available in 2016.

I have been attending Texas Wine and Grape Growers Association (TWGGA) seminars and will also be attending Newsom Grape Day at the end of the month to learn from the best growers. Local growers have also offered to give advice since the growing area in the Gulf Coast is different than the High Plains.

The winery will appropriately be called Texas Wine Lover Winery. A tasting room will be built as part of our three car garage in addition to one bay being the production facility. We are also excited to announce that our winemaker will be Dave Potter from The Grapes Around Texas. He has been making great progress in becoming a quality winemaker and we are excited to have the opportunity to use his talents after three more years of experience. We will be working closely with Dave during the years to ensure the wine produced is of the upmost quality.

We look forward to seeing you at the winery in three years. Cheers!