Williams Selyem Winery
The garage project that made American Pinot Noir serious, in the Russian River Valley.
Williams Selyem turned a Sonoma garage hobby into the wine that made American Pinot Noir serious. Burt Williams and Ed Selyem built a cult following in the 1980s and a Russian River Valley mailing list so long it became the model for allocation only wineries across the country.
Two friends and a garage
Burt Williams and Ed Selyem started making wine on weekends in 1979 because they could not afford the red Burgundies they loved. They went commercial in 1981 under the name Hacienda del Rio, their first wine a Zinfandel, and changed the label to their own surnames after a larger winery objected.
Neither man had formal training. They learned by tasting, and they trusted great vineyards over technique.
The wine that changed the conversation
Their breakthrough came with single vineyard Pinot Noir, most famously from the Rochioli vineyard on Westside Road. An early Williams Selyem Pinot won the sweepstakes at the California State Fair, beating thousands of entries and announcing that the Russian River Valley could grow Pinot Noir to rival anywhere.
Critics and collectors followed, and the wines became almost impossible to buy at release.
The list
Demand ran so far ahead of supply that Williams Selyem built a waiting list, at times two to three years long, and sold most of its wine directly to members. That mailing list became one of the most coveted in American wine and the template that dozens of cult producers later copied.
In 1998 the partners sold the winery to New York businessman John Dyson, who kept the name, the philosophy, and the Westside Road home.
What Williams Selyem makes now
The estate still centers on single vineyard Pinot Noir from across the Russian River Valley and Sonoma Coast, with Zinfandel and Chardonnay rounding out the range. The house style favors balance and vineyard character over weight.
It remains one of the names most often used to define what Sonoma Pinot Noir can be.
Visiting Williams
The winery sits on Westside Road between Healdsburg and Guerneville, in the heart of Russian River Valley Pinot country. Visits and purchases are organized around list membership rather than a walk in tasting room, in keeping with the allocation model the founders invented.
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