Red Willow Vineyard

Red Willow Vineyard is a grape-growing estate located in the far western end of Yakima Valley AVA, within the Yakama Indian Reservation.

[2] The land that is today Red Willow Vineyard has had a long history as part of the homeland for the Yakama Nation of the Columbia Plateau.

Following a series of tribal wars in the 1850s, the confederate tribes of the Yakama Nation moved to their current reservation south of the present day city of Yakima, Washington.

[3] In the 1920s, the Stephenson family purchased parts of what is now Red Willow Vineyard from the Yakama Nation tribe and planted it to alfalfa and potatoes while raising cattle on the higher slopes.

[4] The land continued to be a working farm until the late 1960s when Mike Sauer (who had married into the Stephenson family) returned home from college and began planting Concord grapes.

Eventually the "Merlot boom" would die down and many red varieties were hard hit in the 1996 vintage by a series of arctic blasts that severely reduced the yields of that year.

[5] The English-born Lake had an interest in making Washington wine from European grapes and encouraged Red Willow to expand their plantings.

[5] From the 1983-1991, Red Willow and Columbia winery would pioneer the commercial planting and first varietal wines of many grape varieties including Malbec, Mourvedre, Nebbiolo, Sangiovese, Syrah, Tempranillo and Viognier.

[6] At the urging of David Lake, Mike Sauer received several cuttings from Joseph Phelps Winery, one of the original California Rhone Rangers, and planted them.

[9] Columbia Winery used the grapes from the 1988 vintage to make the first varietal Syrah in Washington State which went on received critical acclaim from even French Rhône producers.

[5] The vineyards sit between 1100–1300 feet above the ancient floodplain left over from the cataclysmic Missoula floods that ravaged the area between 15,000-13,000 years ago.