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Hi Wine Friends,
I just recorded my eighth interview for Her Way and wanted to share what the experience has been like.
In case you missed it, I’ve been given the opportunity to produce a podcast about women in wine! Her Way is produced in collaboration with Todos Media, a new PDX-based platform amplifying the voices and stories of women, BIPOC, and LGBTQ+ folks in the hospitality and culture space. They launched their YouTube channel less than a month ago and just crossed 20k subscribers! Todos is producing 12 shows simultaneously, and Her Way is one of them.
Her Way gives me the incredible opportunity to sit down with female winemakers, sommeliers, wine writers, chefs, farmers, and more—women who inspire me and whose stories I’m dying to hear. Each episode allows me to pick their brains about how they’ve found success while staying sane, grounded and true to themselves in male-dominated industries.
So far, I’ve been floored by the depth of wisdom, insight, and levity these incredible ladies have shared!
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Episode One featured Tiquette Bramlett, the first Black woman to ever run a U.S. winery. We discussed her early life as an opera singer, her victory over cancer, and how her relationship with her mother led her to the world of wine.
Episode Two featured Kate Norris, co-owner and winemaker of Division Winemaking Co. We talked about being an outsider, welcoming the unknown, and how her background in interior design and event planning informs her work as a winemaker.
Interestingly, I’ve found that nearly every woman I’ve spoken to has an artistic or creative side—whether it’s painting, writing, music, or design—that parallels and informs their passion for wine.
This week’s episode with Kelley Fox holds a special place in my heart. Kelley inspired the idea for this podcast during a conversation we had at a wine dinner this summer, where she opened my eyes to how differently she—and perhaps all women—approach winemaking. She speaks about her process so openly and intuitively, always leaning into uncertainty and experimentation rather than control and rigidity.
So when Kelley agreed to be one of Her Way's inaugural guests (especially in the middle of harvest!), I was beyond thrilled. Our conversation exceeded my expectations. We talked about biodynamics and regenerative farming, but we also delved into plant medicine, the divine feminine, and how a vineyard can be viewed as music for the winemaker to play.
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I have plenty more conversations lined up, and I would love for you to check them out and share your thoughts!
Her Way is available on YouTube if you want to see our faces, or on Spotify and Apple Podcasts if you prefer to listen on the go. If you enjoy what you hear, please consider subscribing or sharing—your support helps us keep this project going! I can’t wait to hear what you think and what ideas you have for topics or potential guests.
Thank you, as always, for being part of this special community and for sharing my love for wine!
Cheers and until next week,
Kelsey
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Excerpt from my conversation with Kelley Fox:
Kelsey: I’ve heard you talk about wine in terms of music and art, like the experience of drinking a wine is almost like hearing a song or even making the wine as hearing the song of the vineyard. Is that still something that rings true for you?
Kelley: Well, you know, like all important topics, words always fall short. It's hard to even know someone by the words and stories they tell you. And same with wine. It's just so inadequate….
People often ask me … why do you do all these different vineyards? And what's the point? And things like that. And that's when I usually bring out the music analogy, which is, I think that each of the different vineyards - I think I've worked with like nine single vineyard Pinots right now - it's as if these places on earth, they've already been written. Imagine Chopin writing an etude, and your job as a pianist is to hear and see what the intention was, and to bring that to the listener, right? And that's my role.
But the problem is, or the problem not as a negative but the task is, as an ape, I need to listen to silence and to see the unseen. That's where the solitude comes in, in working in a void, meaning dropping my ego and trying to bring these songs that were written to the drinker, right?
So this is getting tricky with words, isn't it?
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