STAGIAIRE WINE

San Francisco, CA

Stagiaire Wine is the brainchild of New Orleans native Brent Mayeaux. The project takes its name from Brent’s time spent as an apprentice - or stagiaire - at various wineries around the world at the beginning of his career. He began by working under more conventionally-minded winemakers in California, but it was during experiences in Australia and then France, where his head was turned towards natural wine by the likes of luminaries such as Philippe Bonard in the Jura and Gareth Belton of Gentle Folk in the Adelaide Hills.  

Mayeaux returned to California in 2018 armed with a more European sensibility around winemaking and the role of the vineyard. Initially, he strived to manage his own vines – often a given in France – which is seen as an almost impossibility for most young, non-legacy or finance-backed winemakers in California due to the unattainably high price of vines. 

Following a series of logistical setbacks, exhaustion from the long days and longer drives between vineyards all over northern California, and a general feeling under-appreciation for at  least trying – unlike most natural winemakers in California – to work with what he farmed, Mayeaux shifted tact in 2021 and has begun focusing on négociant grapes from high-quality sites.  He finds this a more manageable approach that allows him to take more care and time in the cellar. After parting ways with a shared cellar space, he moved his winemaking operation to a former industrial space on Treasure Island, a reclaimed piece of land in the middle of the San Francisco Bay.

Brent’s wines are hard to define. There are the crazy bottlings easier put into the “natty” space (a piquette-like creation; a co-ferment of Merlot and Sauvignon). But a seriousness and  patience, a precision and deft touch, shines through in most of his wines, particularly the single parcel Sauvignon Blancs and Pinot Noirs. He makes many cuvées each vintage, often  shifting approaches year to year based on available fruit and what its potential might deliver in the bottle. Whatever they might be or not be, we find Stagiaire to represent the best of  California today: natural winemaking in a place that has always been suspicious of the label, but with a dedication to terroir.