"Sometimes the most meaningful things are born from the moments we never planned."
There are years you remember because everything goes according to plan.
Then there are years that redefine everything.
For Patricia Green Cellars, 2020 became the latter.
After two decades spent farming vineyards across Oregon's Ribbon Ridge and crafting wines that reflected the individuality of each site, harvest was approaching with extraordinary promise. The vineyards were healthy, the fruit was developing beautifully, and the season had all the signs of becoming one of the finest in the winery's history.
Then September arrived.
Within days, historic wildfires swept across Oregon. Smoke settled over the Willamette Valley, covering vineyards that had been carefully tended throughout the growing season. More than one million acres burned across the state, and the grapes that represented an entire year's work suddenly faced an uncertain future.
For many wineries, the damage marked the end of the vintage.
For Patricia Green Cellars, it became the beginning of a different conversation.
Choosing a Different Path
One thing never changed.
The commitment to the growers.
Fruit had been cultivated all season by families who had trusted Patricia Green Cellars with their vineyards. Those relationships had been built over decades, and the winery honored every one of those commitments by paying growers in full, despite knowing much of the harvest could never become the wines it was intended to be.
The question then became:
What do you do with something that can no longer become wine?
For Jim Anderson and the Patricia Green team, throwing it away never felt like the right answer.
Years of farming, careful viticulture, and extraordinary fruit deserved another opportunity.
Looking Beyond Wine
Instead of asking how to save the vintage...
The team began asking a different question.
What could this become?
Working alongside Oregon distiller Lynsee Sardell, the smoke-affected Pinot Noir was carefully distilled into a remarkably textured brandy. Rather than hiding the challenges of the vintage, they embraced the opportunity to create something entirely new.
That brandy would eventually become one of the defining ingredients in Patty Green Whiskey Distillers.
It wasn't a backup plan.
It became the foundation of an entirely new chapter.
A Winery's Perspective on Whiskey
Most whiskey distilleries begin with grain.
Patty Green began with decades of understanding fermentation, oak, agriculture, and the subtle relationship between land and flavor.
Long before the first whiskey barrel was filled, Patricia Green Cellars had spent years exploring how different vineyard sites expressed themselves through wine.
Those same questions naturally carried into whiskey.
What happens when exceptional ingredients meet thoughtful craftsmanship?
How does Oregon express itself through grain as clearly as it does through Pinot Noir?
Could whiskey tell the same story of place?
The answers became Patty Green Whiskey Distillers.
Rooted in Oregon
Beginning in 2021, the project expanded beyond brandy.
Heritage barley and rye were sourced from Oregon family farms, malted locally, distilled individually, and blended with small amounts of the Pinot Noir brandy. The resulting whiskey was aged in renewed Patricia Green French oak barrels and Oregon-made oak barrels, creating a spirit that remains deeply connected to the region where it began.
Every step stayed close to home.
Every ingredient remained rooted in Oregon.
Every decision reflected the same philosophy that had guided the winery for years.
More Than Whiskey
Today, Patty Green Whiskey Distillers is not simply an extension of Patricia Green Cellars.
It is the continuation of the same philosophy through a different medium.
The focus remains unchanged:
Respect the land.
Honor the people who farm it.
Allow exceptional ingredients to speak for themselves.
Because great whiskey, like great wine, begins long before the bottle.
