Early Years

Julia Cresto was raised in San Diego California, a fourth generation San Diegan grew up driving on dirt roads through strawberry fields on her way to the beach ages away from the wine world. Through dumb luck, she ended up in Oregon to attend Oregon State University for the Fermentation Science program. There she studied applied chemistry and became a cheesemaker. Though after years of working in the universities creamery she traded in cheese curds for wine grapes. She took a leap and worked her first harvest in California at E&J Gallo in 2014, she worked with research and development experimenting with new technologies and traditional winemaking techniques. Always having a questioning mind, she feel in love with winemaking and all of the challenges it posed.

After graduating, Julia set out to give herself a practical education in winemaking by learning through doing. She worked under world class winemakers in Napa Valley, New Zealand’s Hawke’s Bay and Central Otago region, Australia’s McClaren Vale but always felt a pull back to Oregon. Julia came back to Oregon in 2016 and first worked under Lynn Penner Ash in her first Oregon wine harvest experience. Julia dedicated her time to learning how Oregon Pinot Noir expressed itself in each AVA and how each region of the Willamette Valley had microclimatic variation. Julia’s first year back in Oregon made her fall in love with Oregon wine, its community and gave her a sense of grounding that tied her to this land.

Following Penner Ash, Julia worked under Josh Bergstrom and discovered her true passion for wine in Chardonnay. Under a great chardonnay winemaker, Julia strived to absorb everything she could about chardonnay winemaker from Josh Bergstrom. Through his Burgundian training and influence Julia learned the nuances and art of chardonnay winemaking through the Bergstrom lense.

Eager to learn more and make her own imprint, Julia searched for a place that she could call home in the Willamette Valley and set roots. As luck would have it, she ended up at the doorstep of the original female winemaker in Oregon, Luisa Ponzi. Luisa has been Julia’s biggest influence on her winemaking career. Through shared love of chardonnay and experimentation, Luisa has pushed Julia to question and push the envelope forward even if the outcomes don’t always work out.

Inaugural Vintage

In 2019, Julia and her family purchased a small farm outside of McMinnville with a couple acres of Pinot Noir grapes on them. Julia has managed the farm since the purchase, raising dexter cattle, chickens, sheep, growing extensive gardens and orchards, improving what they can to make their land a healthier ecosystem than what it was before.

In 2020, Julia focused almost all her energy on the farm during the pandemic. With alot of unknowns, Julia took the courageous leap to make wine from her families vineyard. 2020 was a beautiful growing season and she could not wait to get her hands on this fruit.

However, the day before her picking crew came a hundred year wind storm whipped through the Willamette Valley. 50 plus mile per hour winds ripped through, it was almost like a tornado came through things flying through the air. The wind stopped before the morning she was able to pick her beautiful Pommard and the fruit was being trucked to her winery smoke moved into the Willamette Valley and fires were sparked. She could not even unload her fruit because of all of the fire engines that were coming to fill up on water from the pond at the winery. The Bald peak fire had just started less than two miles away.

Julia rushed to press her fruit, get it into tank before having to be evacuated from the winery. She drove over the Chehalem mountains and back down the hill into Newbery, and the clear skies that had been over her quickly changed to a scene more familar in a lord of the rings film of Mordor. The sun was blocked out, the sky completely black, and the temperature had dropped 20 degrees. Unfortunately this is how our region spent the next two weeks, just paused no development of fruit, no ability to go outside because the air being too toxic.

For a lot of wineries, 2020 is a lost year. It is a travesty for the growers who spent a full year tending these vines for a total crop loss. It is a heartbreak for the winemakers who tried all the tools they could think of, but in the end we just do not have the technology yet to fix these catastrophic weather.

Where we are going

Since that first year, Julia has been continuing to produce methode traditionale sparkling wine. Expanding into Blanc de Blanc and Sparkling Pinot Blanc, now with 3 vintages of wines in tirage, she has been dialing in her style of sparkling winemaking. Focusing on achieving austere acidity with lively and unusual aromatics. She is not afraid to try and experiment, the Willamette Valley is just starting to create the standard for Oregon Sparkling wine and this blank canvas of wine style is what excited Julia most. As Little Hellions on this path she plans to keep pushing and experimenting, we are yet to identify ourselves with Sparkling wine on the world stage.

Join us on this journey to define Oregon Sparkling wine.

“And always, Raise a glass and some hell…”

-Julia Cresto, Winemaker