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Three wines from Prince Edward County have won gold.

Hubbs Creek Vineyard’s 2019 Pinot Noir, Huff Estates’ 2021 Catharine’s Chardonnay and Lighthall’s 2022 Riesling rose to the top at this summer’s WineAlign. 23 judges tasted 1,930 entries from 255 Canadian wineries at the association of wine critics’ National Wine Awards of Canada ceremony in Penticton, British Columbia this summer.

The Gazette spoke with the makers of these wines to get a sense of what goes into making an award-winning vintage, especially here, in Prince Edward County.

Battista Calvieri of Hubbs Creek came to wine making by way of exploring his Italian heritage. He “got the bug” on a trip to Italy in 1999, and upon returning to Ontario, decided that the Niagara region was too expensive. The County was relatively unknown for wine at the time, “it was rural, lost in time” — but it was affordable. Planting his first vines in 2001, Mr. Calvieri, a patient man, produced his first commercial product in 2009. But he did not retire from his job as a microscope technician at the University of Toronto until just three years ago.

Frédéric Picard confirms the need for patience in a new wine-growing region. Born in France and raised in its well-established wine industry, he joined the Huff Estates winery in 2002, just as its first vines were planted. The first ten of his twenty years here were a challenge, until the vines matured and a supportive local culture began to develop toward what he calls a “cruising” stage.

Chris Thompson of Lighthall is the youngest of the winning winemakers. He joined the winery in 2018, hailing from Orillia, and working his way through the Toronto restaurant industry before taking some courses in winemaking at George Brown College. Owner Glen Symons took him under his wing — and into the cellar — as an assistant. And now Mr. Thompson is Lighthall’s chief winemaker.

Mr. Thompson also speaks of coming to a supportive culture, the “rising tide that floats all boats.” Rather than competing, County wineries share resources, including grapes, and customers. “It would be boring if all our wines tasted the same,” says Mr. Picard. “I’m happy when someone finds a delicious wine, wherever they find it.”

Mr. Thompson is proud that local wines are getting national, and even international, recognition. He hopes that government at all levels, municipal, provincial and federal, recognizes the impact of the wine industry not only on the economy, but on our culture. “A vineyard is like a heritage building: we have a responsibility to maintain it,” he notes.

“Wine growing isn’t just agriculture. It’s culture. Traditional farming grows the food and sends it away. Wine culture remains in place, grown, packaged and sold in the County. It brings the restaurants, the hotels and the visitors to us,” said Mr. Calvieri. He didn’t expect the boom in cultural tourism when he began, but now he sees that the wineries have been a catalyst to a transformation of life in the County. In enriching and expanding farm-to-table culture, local viticulture has even encouraged traditional agriculture to find ways to keep its investment local.

All three agree that making wine in the county is not for the fainthearted. The climate here is not that of France, or Italy, or even Niagara. The winters are especially harsh, and the level ground makes for bitter winds. Grape growers must painstakingly bury their vines at the end of each autumn, in the hopes that they will survive the winter.

Huff Estates’ Mr. Picard notes that the extremes brought on by climate change include not only colder winters, but also problematic heat waves over the summer, which can shut down growth, or, in combination with heavy rains, bring on disease. “I don’t remember such extremes fifteen years ago.”

The pinot fruit is especially sensitive, says Hubbs Creek’s Mr. Calvieri, calling it “the heartbreak grape” — wonderful when it survives but difficult to grow.

All three winemakers are philosophers by necessity. The fragility of the vines and the vagaries of the weather require an acceptance of and adaptation to whatever fate throws their way. “In the end, we all depend on mother nature,” says Mr. Picard. As this harvest season approaches, they are watching the weather closely, calculating how much more sun they can get on their grapes. This is partly scientific, balancing acidity with sugar content, partly an “art form,” as Mr. Calvieri puts it, speaking warmly of the way a good wine works with a meal, back and forth.

Although they strive for consistency, something recognizable that will bring people back, the relationship with the land and the weather each year makes every vintage a bit different. “Every wine is a time and a place in a bottle,” says Lighthall’s Mr. Thompson.

Viticulture is demanding and risky, undertaken by people with a great commitment to the County, its local traditions, and its place in the world. Wine is a social commodity, and these winemakers never forget that their product is intended to provide both an aesthetic an a communal experience. The best thing about the well-deserved attention that will come of these gold medals is that it will bring people together, from near and far.