Dear Friends, Almost exactly a year ago, I was asked to speak at the incredible 2023 Napa Rise event in California, sponsored by Napa Green. If you don’t know Napa Green, it is one of the most thoughtful certification programs I have seen, providing concierge-level service to growers, wherever they are on their journey, while […]
Can Biodiversity Create Terroir: A Conversation With Mimi Casteel
Here is a deep dive into one of my favorite questions, in an interview with Joseph V Micallef, published in Forbes, October 22, 2023. “You have suggested that the microflora in a vineyard, especially the portion that coinhabits a grape vine’s rooting system, plays a critical role in translating soil features into a […]
What if things get better?
“As the predictions of climate scientists become reality, imagining a better future can feel impossible. But hope might be right beneath our feet… Mimi Casteel shows us what’s possible with regenerative agriculture.” Read the full story by Pulitzer finalist Karen Russell in Esquire, October 19, 2023 Read it here: What If Things Get Better?
A Drink from the Well of Improbable Hope
An Autumnal Tale with a most Improbable End Equinox Eve, Sept 22, 2023 Friends, Once a year, just before the first rain beetle takes flight, as the angle of shifting light splits umbrellas of leaves in a syrupy prism of golden green into carmine, as the redolence of sappy summer dries to a heavy blaze […]
Blush and the Bovine – A tale of two deaths and eternal life
As goes rosé, so goes beef. Rosé is dead, long live rosé Whilst summer fills our cups with sunshine, before her longest day grows dim, let us pass a moment together and let our thoughts be fluid, quenching the desiccated landscapes of our wrung-out minds. Put down spinning worries and numbing problems and let’s make […]
“Is this thing on?” In which Mimi gets a Microphone
Uh, for those of you who just tuned in, the Pinedale Shopping Mall has just been bombed with live turkeys. Film at eleven. ~Dr Johnny Fever I’ve got lists. Do you have them? For me, listing is a love / hate relationship. It’s like all kinds of things that I know I should do; I […]
new Hope Well, and new wines!
HUNTER’S MOON October 9, 2022 Friends, First and foremost, we finally have some Pinot Noir to sell and I’m so excited to share these wines with you. As you know from my earlier letter about Vendange 2021, these are the last wines I made at my old site, and for that their stories carry special […]
Bated Breath – Vendange 2021
‘New beginnings are often disguised as painful endings’ ~Lao Tzu We ended how we started, by singing on the land. That vintage 2021 marked the beginning of yet another decade in this millennium was a truth I only appreciated in retrospect. That it was the last harvest for me at 12345 Oak Road (seriously, that […]
New Release 2021 wines from Hope Well
Hi there, Friends, It’s been a few turns. You’ve changed. I’ve changed. Everything has changed. What, in the pandemic, we may have mistaken for a temporary, though massive, perturbation in our lives, may have in fact been the changing of a deeper rhythm of our lives. But that is another post, and today it is […]
Trees in Viticulture? Podcast with Mimi Casteel
Why is it relevant to talk about trees in viticulture? Earlier this year I had a chance to explore this important and relatively new topic in regenerative viticulture in a podcast with Pauline Vicard, Executive Director of ARENI, “a global research and action institute dedicated to the future of a Fine Wine world sustainably evolving […]
Mimi Casteel Revisited – Is Wine Big Enough, Organic Wine Podcast
My second interview on Organic Wine Podcast last December was a welcome opportunity to explore where I am going next on my Hope Well journey. Adam Huss never fails to ask the difficult and interesting questions. For instance, Is Wine Big Enough? Mimi Casteel Revisited – Is Wine Big Enough? December 6, 2021 Mimi Casteel started […]
Silver Linings
Catalyst: an agent that provokes or speeds significant change or action Most of you who follow Hope Well now know that 2020 was a catalyst. If you read Vendange 2020: the Hardest Lessons Yet, the events of 2020 were yet unfolding as I wrote that post, still eager to see what the harvest would yield, […]
The Nitty Gritty on No-Till
Dear friends, I had the great pleasure recently of diving into a nitty-gritty conversation about no-till agriculture with Jesse Frost on his No-Till Market Garden Podcast. This is a podcast by real farmers for real farmers and Jesse knows how to ask interesting questions about how regenerative no-till farming actually works on real farms. […]
No Time Left
Presented at the Acres USA Healthy Soils Summit August 26, 2021 Hi everyone, my name is Mimi, and my farm is in Oregon. I’m very honored to be a part of this day with you. I’d like to begin by sharing a story about where we are, as a way of beginning a conversation about […]
Hope Well Journey
There is no easy way to start a letter like this. For years you have been on this journey with me. We have traversed the hard-won successes and the setbacks of trying to reimagine agriculture at the family farm scale. When I left Bethel Heights, this farm, this place, was where I lived. It was […]
Seeking an Optimum and Never a Maximum – Slow Wine Manifesto
Last October I was honored to be invited to join several winemakers from around the world who participated by video in the introduction of the Slow Wine Manifesto in Italy on October 11, 2020. My part was nice and short, but it gave me the opportunity to appreciate one of the brilliantly stated key principals […]
The Regenerate Forum: Regenerative Methods in Viticulture
Dear Friends, Last year I had the great pleasure of being interviewed by Andrew Keen on his new webcast, Regenerate Forum. Mr. Keen fears no controversy, having made a career of tackling the great political dilemmas of our time, and his experience makes this a fun spin on my usual topics: https://www.regenerateforum.org/interviews I highly recommend Mr. Keen’s […]
Outcasts
I have few more pungent olfactory memories than those from the late summers of my childhood. The grapes growing softer and sweeter, the smell of the grasses changing from green and sappy to spicy, sweet and dry, the crackling of insect noises in the fields and forests. But nothing could compare to the purple-black, heady […]
“Controversial and even Incendiary” Interview with Organic Wine Podcast
Dear Friends, Here is an interview I did with Adam Huss about a month ago on his Organic Wine Podcast. This was an interview I totally enjoyed because Adam asked me the kind of “controversial and even incendiary” questions I really like to talk about. ~Mimi
Vendange 2020: The Hardest Lessons Yet
Dear Friends, Outside of my field notes, I rarely write in the growing season or near the harvest. Keeping up with the work takes 110% physical and mental presence, but this year I have decided that some things should not be looked at in the rearview. I have wanted to maintain a spirit of both […]
Mimi Casteel of Hope Well Wine in Oregon is Crusading for Regenerative Agriculture
Sustainability was the theme of Jancis Robinson’s 2020 writing competition, and this story about Hope Well was submitted for the competition by American Katie Quinn. Thanks, Katie, for taking that detour to Oregon! READ THE STORY
NYT: “From Good Wine, a Direct Path to the Wonders of Nature”
In this beautiful and heartfelt piece, Eric Asimov perfectly captures how our interactions with food, especially wine, can inspire and move us toward a new relationship with the natural world. Read in the New York Times (Subscription Required) Graphic: Brian Britigan
Mimi interviewed by Levi Dalton on “I’ll Drink to That!”
LISTEN NOW – Airdate: July 10, 2019 The latest episode of Levi Dalton’s “I’ll Drink to That!” podcast was released this week, and it features owner and winegrower Mimi Casteel. “Mimi sees a through line between viticulture as agriculture, and agriculture as an engagement with the natural world. How do you see that line? After listening […]
Tractor Time Podcast: Mimi Casteel on Regenerative Wine
Dear Friends, A long time ago my dear friend Mark Sturges introduced me to the Acres Conference, and ever since it has been a yearly pilgrimage to connect with and be inspired by others working in holistic farming systems. I had the great honor of sitting down with the delightful host of the Acres podcast, Tractor Time, at the […]
Mimi Casteel: Imbibe 75 2020 Wine Person of the Year
The attention and interest in regenerative agriculture over the last year has been nothing short of dizzying. I am grateful, and hopeful that the light that shines on the movement now will guide and protect the mission as we move into a new and critical decade. – Mimi Casteel “Mimi Casteel is our Imbibe 75 2020 Wine […]
Who’s Really Trampling out the Vintage?
Who’s Really Trampling out the Vintage?Una nota de gracias About a year back, when I was still working with my dear friends at Lingua Franca, I found myself navigating the darkest hour between their night harvest and my dawn harvest at Hope Well. Not enough time to go home and get a nap, too tired […]
In Oregon Wine Country, One Farmer’s Battle to Save the Soil
“Agriculture can play a leading role in combating climate change and reversing ecological damage. Mimi Casteel is showing one way to get it done.” Read the full story by Eric Asimov in The New York Times, published October 17, 2019
Mimi Casteel Is Betting the Farm
How one farmer, biologist and winemaker is trying to change an entire industry’s mind about the way it grows wine. Read the full story by Leslie Pariseau in PUNCH, published August 22, 2019.
An urgent conversation about the power of regenerative agriculture
Last month I had the honor of participating in this public seminar with three of my intellectual heroes, sponsored by my far-sighted and generous New York distributor, Polaner Selections. The entire seminar, including audience participation, was recorded and is here presented in its entirety. Please join us! – Mimi Casteel “Please join carbon farming ‘bioneers’ Mimi Casteel […]
An Earth Day Letter to my Friends, for my Friends
My Comrades and Kin, As we revel in the gifts of spring, watching the vineyards push first growth, I beg your attention for a moment of community around our shared love for this land, for this earth. Many of you pledged your name to an agreement we have named The Oak Accord. The nature of […]