Papapietro Perry sits on Dry Creek Road, in the old Timber Crest Farms collective, but its heart is Russian River Pinot Noir. The winery grew out of a friendship between Ben Papapietro and Bruce Perry, two men who worked the circulation desk at the San Francisco newspapers and made wine in a garage on the side. Ben had learned the craft in the 1970s helping Burt Williams (of Williams Selyem) make garage wine and working his harvests; he and Bruce made wine together for thirteen years before going commercial in 1998 with seventy-five cases. They now make around eight thousand.
Single-Vineyard Russian River Pinot Noir: as many as ten vineyard- and clone-designate bottlings a vintage, the house specialty.
777 and Pommard Clone Pinots: clonal selections vinified separately across sites.
Zinfandel: a small-lot counterpoint to the Pinot.
Rosé of Pinot Noir: a popular free-run pink.
Around eight thousand cases a year, each lot kept separate by vineyard and clone from harvest to punch-down.
The house is built on single-vineyard Pinot Noir: as many as ten bottlings in a vintage, each vineyard and clone kept separate through fermentation and aging, with a little Zinfandel and Chardonnay alongside. It remains two families: Ben and Yolanda Papapietro, Bruce and Renae Perry, with Renae as CEO. Bruce Perry died in 2022, a year short of the twenty-fifth anniversary. Tastings are on the patio, seated with a cheese pairing or standing at the bar. The wines are made, as they say, from harvest to punch-down by hand.
