People often ask about the origins of Lenné Estate. The name and face of on the logo look French, but the gentlemen is actually English.
Mr. Leonard Hole, aka "Lenny" aka "Len the Hen" was the father of Karen Lutz, who with her husband Steve, founded Lenne Estate in 2000. Steve is the proprietor, and has been the winemaker since our first vintage in 2004. Karen's father Lenny was a bit of a country squire, with a chicken farm near the small village of Wokingham, located some 25 miles west of London. Lenny passed away in 1999, but left his three daughters a bit of inheritance, and Karen's share was turned into the downpayment on the property that became our vineyard. Sadly, Lenny never got to visit the vineyard named after him, but we like to think he is up there now, happily watching over our vineyard and winery.
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Lenny with his daughter Karen.
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What Steve didn’t know was how difficult the site would be to farm. There are many gray areas in wine, but if there is one truth, it is that great wines come from poor soils. Vines are built for reproducing themselves and poor soils control vigor and produce very high quality fruit.
At Lenné we can vouch for the fact that this soil is about as bad as they come. It’s marine sedimentary soil, mostly the uncommon "peavine" type, and when you dig into it you wonder how anything grows. We have had our share of disasters and lost thousands of plants over the years we have been here. We have paid a price for our determination (or stupidity) not to irrigate and we have made our share of mistakes and felt them sting. After a few rough years early on we started making wine out of the fruit and all that pain started to disappear. The wine immediately revealed why you must grow Pinot Noir in difficult places; to produce delicious wines totally reflective of one specific place. For us and we hope for you, that place is Lenné.
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