Oregon Chardonnay Celebration 2018

Josh Bergström
Bergström Wines

Josh Bergström has been crafting Pinot Noir and Chardonnay in Oregon’s Willamette Valley for 22 years.  He is owner, general manager and winemaker at his family’s eponymous winery Bergström Wines in Newberg, Oregon where he and his team farm 85 acres of Biodynamic Pinot Noir and Chardonnay from 5 different sub AVA’s of the Northern Willamette Valley. A native Oregonian, Josh studied business at the University of Oregon before going on to receive a postgraduate degree in Viticulture and Enology in Beaune, France where he met his wife Caroline, a native Burgundian, who was studying Wine and Spirits marketing at the famed Lycée Viticole de Beaune.  Together they roamed the Burgundian hillside villages, depleting communal stores of wine, bread, jambon persillé and almost made escargots an endangered species before returning to Oregon to co-direct their family winery.

Jason Lett
The Eyrie Vineyards

Jason Lett is the second-generation president, winemaker, vineyard manager, (and self-proclaimed curator) of The Eyrie Vineyards. As the son of vanguard producers David and Diana Lett, Jason has had almost 50 years of experience with Oregon vineyards and winemaking, and has worked in Europe and New Zealand as well. He combines hands-on experience with a background in research ecology. When he’s not making wine, Jason and his wife tend a small farm of their own with livestock, including goats, sheep, chickens, and three growing children.

Anna Matzinger
Matzinger Davies Wine Company

Anna Matzinger arrived in the Willamette Valley for the harvest of 1999 with several years of traveling winemaking experience, an excellent Kiwi partner, and hopes of making some of the world’s finest Pinot noir. She spent the next 14 years working to further develop the distinction, prestige, and renown of Archery Summit wines as winemaker and co-general manager.   

In 2006, with that same Kiwi partner, now husband, father and Executive Winemaker at A to Z Wineworks & REXHILL, Matzinger Davies Wine Company began, with the intention of producing vibrant and authentic small lot AVA based Pinot noir and Chardonnay from the Willamette Valley and single site Sauvignon Blanc and Grenache from the Columbia River Gorge.  Anna now divides her time between Matzinger Davies, winemaking consulting, various boards and committees, and nurturing two growing children and an enthusiastic Labrador.  

John Paul
Cameron

John Paul, from Cameron Winery, came to wine from an academic background.  While serving as a research associate of Melvin Calvin at UC Berkeley John made a huge discovery: wine!  The vineyard that eventually emerged in Oregon, after stints in the Napa Valley and New Zealand, looks like a huge experiment (and in fact is!).  The array of  clones that he has assembled in the Clos Electrique Blanc section of the vineyard are one of his most notable and successful experiments.

Wynne
Peterson-Nedry
CHEHALEM

Wynne Peterson-Nedry is a second generation winemaker at CHEHALEM. She was just six-months old when her parents signed on the original property that would become Ridgecrest Vineyards, the original plantings on what is now the famed Ribbon Ridge AVA. 

Wynne got her roots in the footsteps of her father, with a Chemistry degree from Bryn Mawr College in 2002, after which she went on to experience several careers in the outside world before admitting to the fact that her heart resided in the Oregon wine country. She graduated with a Masters’ degree from UC Davis’ Viticulture & Enology program in 2008 and went on to work vintages all over the world, including two in New Zealand, one in California, and a 6-month scholarship and internship in Burgundy, France. She officially joined the CHEHALEM family as assistant winemaker in June of 2009, and in early 2012 became CHEHALEM’s head winemaker.

Thomas Savre
Lingua Franca

A native of France, Thomas Savre is among the most accomplished and energetic young winemakers in Oregon.  He joined Lingua Franca in May 2015 from his prior position at Evening Land, where he worked closely with Dominique Lafon to create Pinot noir and Chardonnay from Seven Springs Vineyard, directly adjacent to the LS Vineyard.

Thomas worked in several prestigious estates in Burgundy including Domaine de la Romanée Conti (Vosne-Romanée), Domaine de Bellene (Nicolas Potel’s project in Beaune), Domaine Dujac (Morey Saint Denis), Maison Nicolas Potel (Nuits-Saint-Georges), and Domaine Chevrot (Cheilly-les-Maranges, Côte de Beaune).  

At the Jules Guyot Institute, University of Burgundy, from 2008 through 2012, he earned a Bachelor’s degree in Wine Science, and two Masters degrees, one in Viticulture Practices and the other in Enology and Winemaking.

As the Winemaker at Lingua Franca, Thomas crafts elegant wines that speak to the place from which they come and which have earned early, yet significant, accolades.