Sequitur

Mike Etzel, the founder and winemaker of Sequitur, is a living legend in the Willamette Valley.  He co-founded Beaux Freres in the late 80’s and was the winemaker there until recently passing the duties to his son.  Never one to rest on his laurels or stay still, though, he began planting a vineyard adjacent to Beaux Freres in 2010—a project that became what we know as Sequitur.

It’s helpful to think of Sequitur as a distillation of everything Mike Etzel learned while starting and producing Beaux Freres over the decades.  The Sequitur vineyard sits right next to the Beaux Freres “Upper Terrace” but is planted to a wider array of clones at tighter spacing.  It’s been farmed biodynamically since the beginning and is sheltered with Douglas Fir—in short, it’s the fully realized vision of a man who’s helped define Willamette Valley Pinot.

The winemaking style is exactly what you’d expect—these are wines that are made by the same hand that delivered so many high scores to Beaux Freres (though his son, Mikey, is the day-to-day winemaker). Big, powerful and bold, these nevertheless have energy and grace that we think comes from the extra-attentive farming and unique clonal selection in the vineyard.  In short order, they’ve established themselves as one of the very best producers in the Willamette Valley and deserve your attention as such.