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CONTROVERSY IS

THE SPICE OF LIFE
SILHOUETTE

JUICY COUTURE IN OREGON

LA EYEWORKS
COACH While some might say the wide range of
Pinot styles made in the state could confuse
KATE SPADE consumers, the bulk of the wine trade seems

MAUI JIM to think that the state’s diverse regions are
finally coming into their own and success-
SMITH fully fine tuning their own regional and sig-
nature styles.
OAKLEY
“Oregonians are very attached to their free-
dom of expression. I am not sure if we are
Eye Exams by Dr. Garry Kappel, OD FCOVD ready for a unified standard for the state,”
shares Dana Keller, director of food and bev-
erage at the Ashland-based Neuman Hotel
CONTACT LENSES | GLASSES | SUNGLASSES Group, which runs several local hotels and

530 Crater Lake Avenue restaurants. That’s true for wine as well as
Medford almost everything else. “In Oregon, we love
541 774-3937 to express our individuality and this car-
www.lassmans.com ries into winemaking as well as life style,”
shares Keller. “The variety of styles of Pinot
Noir offer a platform to educate consum-
ers on how one varietal can show so many
expressions.”
A number of factors contribute to the cor-
nucopia of Pinots found in Oregon. “The sty-
listic differences are tied to soil types, slopes
and elevation along with clonal differences
and some very savvy winemakers are trying
to capture the subtle differences that sites in
Oregon…have to offer,” notes Gregory V.
Jones, the director of the Evenstad Center
for wine education at Linfield University in
McMinnville.
This diversity makes Oregon vineyards,
“a playground for lovers of Pinot Noir to
explore the grape across a variety of grow-
ing regions. Regions with river and ocean
influences and high-elevation mountain
sites are all sitting in the cool and moderate
climatic range ideally suited to the delicate
Pinot Noir grape,” says Boskov. “The charm
of Pinot Noir is its revelatory transparency
of site and place, and Oregon has this in
spades. Even in the grape’s historical home
of Burgundy, the very nature of their clas-
sification system is based around stylistic dif-
ferences from village to village.”

116 www.southernoregonmagazine.com | fall 2020