This February marks nine years since we opened the gates at Saint Tryphon. Nine years is long enough that I realized we’d never actually introduced ourselves — not really. So consider this that reintroduction.
We didn’t set out to build a big winery. We set out to make honest wine from a quiet piece of land in the Texas Hill Country, and honestly, that’s still all we’re trying to do.
Our approach is simple, if a little old-fashioned. Almost all of our wines ferment with native yeast — nothing added to force the process along. We bottle most of them unfined and unfiltered. The only thing we add at all is a touch of sulfur dioxide, the same small intervention winemakers have relied on for centuries to keep a wine stable and honest. Everything else is left to the grape, the season, and time.
That philosophy is part of why we grow varietals most Texas wineries don’t touch — Tannat, Mourvèdre, Albariño, even Aglianico. We didn’t pick them to be different for its own sake. We picked them because they thrive here, in this soil, in this heat, in a way that felt true rather than trendy. We’re even in the middle of an exciting replant on our estate vineyard — more on that soon.
It’s also why the land itself matters so much to us. This property has been standing since the 1890s, long before it was ever a vineyard. We think of it less as a business address and more as a sanctuary — a quiet place where a wine can be tasted slowly, a conversation can run long, and nobody’s rushing you toward the next stop on a tour.
Nine years hasn’t been quiet everywhere, though. Our 2021 Cabernet Franc earned Texas Monthly’s Vintner’s Cup, and our El Jardín Albariño took home a TEXSOM Platinum Award — both wonderful, humbling reminders that this slower way of doing things is worth something.
We’re starting this blog because we have more to say than a wine label allows — about the wines themselves, about this land, about the small, deliberate choices that go into each bottle. We’ll keep these short. We know your time is worth more than a long read, and honestly, we’d rather see you in person than online.
If you haven’t been out to see us yet, we’d love to change that. And if you have, thank you for being part of these ten years.
