Merry Edwards approaches life with graceful intensity. When sampling grapes in the vineyard, hand pruning her cherished roses, preparing dinner for her family, running the rapids on the Colorado River — in whatever she does, Merry balances intellect with intuition. Each wine she makes benefits from her precision and perception of subtlety and elegance.
During her thirty-three year winemaking career, Merry has earned the universal respect of winemaking peers, grape growers and academicians. A self-described perfectionist, she has constantly refined her vineyard practices, wines and techniques. Merry does not rest on her laurels; she grows.
Food was Merry’s gateway to wine. She recalls, “When I was a teenager my mother had cookbooks produced by the California Wine Advisory Board. Wine was an ingredient in every recipe, so I started cooking with wine.”
Fascinated with food chemistry and fermentation in particular, Merry brewed beer as a simple extension of making bread and working with yeast. Then she purchased a book on home winemaking and began to ferment fruit wines. In 1970, when Merry earned her B. S. degree in Physiology from the University of California at Berkeley, her friends knew her as the accomplished amateur who made " The Merry Vintners" wines.
In 1971, while attending graduate school in nutrition at U. C. Berkeley, Merry met Andy Quady who was studying winemaking at the University of California at Davis. “Looking through Andy’s books, I became fascinated,” recalls Merry. “I was surprised to learn one could study winemaking as a discipline.” Within a month, Merry shifted her graduate studies to wine at U. C. Davis. In the winter of 1973 she earned a masters degree in Food Science with an emphasis in Enology. Of the three women in the masters program, only Merry became a winemaker.
While seeking her first winemaking position, Merry encountered gender discrimination time and again. Supported by her mentor, Dr. Maynard Amerine, she stayed the course, pursuing a career as a winemaker, rejecting positions as a laboratory technician, the traditional role of women in the science of winemaking at that time. Merry’s perseverance precipitated changes in hiring policies, paving the way for future generations of women to take charge in the cellar.
Consulting Winemaker Richard Graf and the owners of Mount Eden Vineyards selected Merry to be their winemaker in February 1974. She made three vintages while at Mount Eden and earned a reputation as a rising star in the California wine industry. In 1975 Merry selected cuttings from Mount Eden’s Pinot Noir vineyard and sent them to U.C. Davis for heat treatment (to remove virus) and propagation. This field selection became UCD clone 37, also known as the “Merry Edwards selection” and a star performer in the Russian River Valley.
During the mid-Seventies, she made many trips to Sonoma County, inspired by the pioneering Pinot Noirs made by her good friend, Joe Swan. Merry was taken with the area, particularly the distinctive grapes grown here. “The fruit from Sonoma County was recognizable to me. I could pick out the juicy, rich fruit character in a blind tasting.” When a friend proposed a joint venture with Merry as winemaker, she left Mount Eden and permanently relocated to Sonoma County.
The project fell apart before she was able to make wine, but not before Merry became acquainted with some winegrowers, including David and Sandra Steiner (now Sandra McIver). In summer, 1977 Sandra hired Merry to help build Matanzas Creek Winery from scratch. Merry produced seven acclaimed vintages at Matanzas Creek, catapulting the brand to national prominence. She also developed a very popular style of Sauvignon Blanc, the model for her own varietal wine today.
Prior to Merry’s first vintage at Matanzas Creek Winery, Sandra McIver sent her to France on reconnaissance. Intrigued by clonal research described to her by Dr. Harold Olmo at U. C. Davis, Merry traveled to the University of Beaune where a major study of Pinot Noir clones was underway. She surveyed the experimental vineyards, where the nuances of clonal variation captured Merry''s attention.
The importance of clones was not recognized in California at the time; vintners and farmers alike considered Merry’s focus heretical. “Joe Swan, a primary mentor for me, was one of few who recognized the importance of clones. Joe and Dr. Olmo encouraged my research,” Merry says. She planted seven different clones in Matanzas Creek’s Chardonnay vineyard. Harvesting and segregating the fruit in barrel trials, Merry’s pioneering work forever changed the California wine industry. In 1985 Merry and Dr. Olmo presented the first clonal seminar ever offered at U. C. Davis, where she substantiated clonal significance to skeptical vintners and growers.
In 1984 Merry left Matanzas Creek to devote full time to her consulting business and Merry Vintners, a small winery she and her family founded in the Russian River Valley. Dedicated exclusively to Chardonnay, Merry Vintners enjoyed widespread recognition. Unfortunately the family business was caught in the industry’s downward cycle in the late 1980s. Lenders called back the loans of many small wineries, including Merry Vintners’, and it ceased production in 1989.
Financial restraints interrupted Merry’s career once again when Vintech, an ill-fated investment company, filed for bankruptcy late in 1990. Vintech had recruited Merry as Vice President and Winemaker of Laurier Winery in 1989. She produced two vintages in the new, state of the art winery she helped to build before the bankruptcy pre-empted their release.
Merry’s successful consulting business became her full time profession. Her esteemed reputation and expertise defined a new breed of winemaker: the consultant superstar whose name enhanced the reputation of her client’s brand.
The most exciting and absorbing chapter of Merry''s professional career is her present passion. In 1997 she co-founded a business venture allowing her to produce Merry Edwards Wines from select Pinot Noir grapes in the Russian River Valley and Sonoma Coast, including, for the first time, her own vineyards: Meredith Estate, Coopersmith and Georganne. “ I have always wanted to make wine from the ground up. Today my husband Ken and I are growing over forty acres of Pinot Noir. After many years of being a guest in other wineries, we are building our own, customized Merry Edwards Winery, located at our own Coopersmith Vineyard.”
At home in the Russian River Valley since 1977, Merry has explored the hills, pockets, slopes and hollows, discovering small vineyard properties where site, clone and farming practices produce exceptional grapes. An acknowledged expert in viticulture as well as winemaking, she has developed close working relationships with dedicated vineyard owners, allowing her to influence the farming and harvesting of Pinot Noir, and her other love – Sauvignon Blanc.
Reflecting on her many accomplished years, Merry advises novice winemakers to begin their careers with a dual degree in Viticulture and Enology. “Through experience and study, I have earned my ‘viticulture degree’ in the field. It is very important to me to do everything possible to obtain quality, and that begins in the vineyard,” she says.
Gardening, cooking, literature and family balance Merry’s life. She is devoted to her country gardens, which include more than 50 roses. “I love beauty around me and I love to create my own environment,” she explains. Merry enjoys reading and likens favorite authors to favorite wines - they are each unique and too numerous to mention. Merry raised two sons while successfully managing her career. Now she shares quiet moments and collaborative projects with her husband and partner, Ken Coopersmith.
In many ways Merry Edwards is like her wines—complex, balanced and memorable. An intricate blend of artistic vision, scientific training, spirit and grace, she leaves a lasting impression.
