Warren Winiarski

Warren Winiarski
Warren Winiarski in 2015
Born	1928 Chicago, Illinois
Nationality	Polish American
Occupation	Winemaker and Grape Grower
Known for	Award Winning Winemaker and Preservationist

Warren Winiarski (born 1928) is a Napa Valley winemaker and the founder and former proprietor of Stag's Leap Wine Cellars.

Winiarski owns and operates Arcadia Vineyards in the Coombsville AVA of Napa Valley, which produces Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. He oversees the Winiarski Family Foundation, which dominantly supports educational and charitable causes, in addition to teaching courses at the St. John's College Summer Classics program in Santa Fe, New Mexico. In 2017, Winiarski was inducted into the 11th class of the California Hall of Fame by Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. for his global efforts to showcase and preserve the quality and history of California wine.

Background

Warren Winiarski was born to Stephen and Lottie Winiarski in 1928 in a large Polish section of Chicago, Illinois. His parents owned a livery business in Chicago and his father made honey wine, fruit-flavored, and dandelion wine at home that the family drank on special occasions.^[1]

He studied the western classics curriculum at St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland, graduating in 1952; Winiarski then began his graduate work at the University of Chicago in political theory with Leo Strauss.^[2] While at St. John's College, Winiarski met his wife, Barbara and they were married in 1958.

During his studies at the University of Chicago, Winiarski spent a year in Italy (1954–55) studying the political thinker Niccolo Machiavelli. It was during that year he became convinced that he wanted to become a winemaker. He also lectured in the Basic Program of liberal arts at the University of Chicago while working on his Ph.D. After contributing the chapter on Machiavelli in the Rand McNally textbook, History of Political Philosophy (1963), he shortened his academic studies to an MA degree from the John U. Nef Committee on Social Thought.

Winemaking

In 1964, Warren and Barbara Winiarski moved to Napa Valley, California,^[1] where Winiarski accepted a job as an apprentice winemaker working with Lee Stewart at Souverain Cellars. In 1966 he became first winemaker at Robert Mondavi Winery, while Michael Mondavi was away at National Guard Service.^[3] In 1968, Winiarski left Robert Mondavi Winery to make wine in Colorado at Ivancie Cellars. He selected California grapes that were to be shipped to Denver where they were made into wine. Though Winiarski still lived in California, this project would kickstart the Colorado wine industry.^[4][5]

In 1970, Winiarski and several investors bought a 44-acre prune orchard in the Napa Valley and replanted it to a vineyard. He removed the prune, cherry, and walnuts trees on the property and planted Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. In 1973 Winiarski built a winery near the vineyard and founded Stag's Leap Wine Cellars, and the next year, 1974, he introduced a reserve line, Cask 23.^[1]

In 1989, Warren chaired the Napa Valley Vintners committee that spearheaded and obtained passage of the California state law, State Senate Bill No. 771 (the Conjunctive Labeling Law), which required any wine bottled after January 1, 1990, and labeled with an American Viticultural Area (AVA) located entirely within Napa Valley must also include Napa Valley on the label “in conjunction with the other AVA designation of the wine.” ^[6] This law helped build brand equity for the individual AVAs as well as the Napa Valley, ensuring the region always had two winners and no losers. The law strengthened Napa Valley’s position as a recognized world-class wine region.^[7]

Winiarski had a great influence on prominent winemakers in Napa Valley. In 2003, thirty winemaking alumni and the current winemaking team paid homage to Winiarski through the Hands of Time installation at Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars. Each placed their hands into limestone aggregate to create a plaque. These plaques were mounted as a monument at the winery to remind those in the future of the opportunity to learn and go on. Those in attendance that day included John Kongsgaard, Bob Sessions, John Williams, Dick Ward, Rolando Herrera, Cathy Corison, Françoise Peschon, Paul Hobbs and Michael Silacci. Many of these winemakers had spent their formative years at Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars with Winiarski.^[8]

Winarski has continued his contributions to the Colorado wine industry. In honor of his influence and mentorship to the state's viticultural heritage, he was invited to participate as a Judge at the Colorado Governor's Cup Wine Competition from 2014-2016.^[9] In 2018, he was honored with the “Friends of the Colorado Wine Industry’ award by the Colorado Association of Viticulture and Enology.^[10]

Winiarski currently owns and operates Arcadia Vineyards, in the Coombsville AVA of Napa Valley which produces Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Merlot.

Philanthropy

The Winiarski Family Foundation, has made donations to many conservation and preservation efforts, including those of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, the University of California, Davis, the Land Trust of Napa County, the Napa County Open Space District, the Jack L. Davies Napa Valley Agricultural Preservation Fund, If Given A Chance and The Pathway Home, among other organizations.

The foundation most recently made a $50 million matching grant to St. John’s College in Annapolis and Santa Fe to help bridge the gap between what it costs the college to educate a student and what the student pays in tuition. The grant allowed the two Colleges to lower tuition costs by $17,000. ^[11]

Awards

• 2018 Friends of the Colorado Wine Industry award, Colorado Association of Viticulture and Enology^[10]
• 2017 Inducted into the California Hall of Fame as member of the 11th Class by Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr.^[12]
• 2017 Acre by Acre award, received along with his wife, Barbara, Land Trust of Napa County^[13]
• 2017 Napa Valley Vintners Representative to the Judgment of Paris Tasting’s 40th Anniversary Reenactment in Tokyo, Japan^[14]
• 2017 Person of the Year, Czas Wina Magazine, Kraków, Poland^[15]
• 2016 United States Congressional Resolution 734, commemorating the 1976 Judgment of Paris Tasting’s 40th Anniversary, Capitol Hill, Washington D.C.
• 2013 Thomas Jefferson Award, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts^[16]
• 2010 Distinguished Alumni Award, University of Chicago^[17]

See also

• List of wine personalities
• Judgment of Paris (wine)
• Stag's Leap Wine Cellars

References

Further reading

• Taber, George M. Judgment of Paris: California vs. France and the Historic 1976 Paris Tasting that Revolutionized Wine. NY: Scribner, 2005.
• Winiarski, Warren. Zut alors! The French like California wine.Wines & Vines, April 1991, 72(4), 28.
• Lukacs, Paul. American Vintage - The Rise of American Wine. W.W. Norton, 2005
• Lukacs, Paul. The Great Wines of America. W.W. Norton, 2005
• Lapsley, James. Bottled Poetry. University of California Press, 1997
• Conaway, James. Napa - The Story of an American Eden. Avon Books, reprint ed. 1992
• Chiarello, Michael. Napa Stories - Profiles, Reflections & Recipes from the Napa Valley. Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 2001
• Mondavi, Robert. Harvest of Joy: How the Good Life Became Great Business Harcourt Inc., 1999
• Allhoff, Fritz (editor); Draper, Paul (Foreword). Wine and Philosophy: A Symposium on Thinking and Drinking. Wiley-Blackwell, 2007
• Mendelson, Richard. Appellation Napa Valley: Building and Protecting an American Treasure. Cameron + Company, 2016