New Forty-Five North winery arrives with a bang

You can get progress updates from the Forty-Five North Winery web site

Both MichWine.com and wine writer Sandra Silfven of the Detroit News are reporting on news that the new Forty-Five North winery owned by Indiana ophthalmologist Steven P. Grossnickle has hired accomplished Leelanau winemaker Shawn Walters, who has served as the winemaker for Leelanau Wine Cellars. Silfven writes:

“I’m the luckiest dude in the world,” the 60-year-old Grossnickle said in a recent interview. He glowed about Walters’ accomplishments, which include his sideline job making wine for the new Longview Winery in Cedar, and landing them a bunch of medals last year.

Joel Goldberg of MichWine adds:

“Opportunity is what it took for Shawn,” said local vineyard manager Doug Matthies, supervisor of Forty-Five North’s vineyard plantings. “Here he can concentrate on being a world-class winemaker. He has the opportunity to make $30 – $40 – $50 bottles and get on the world market with them.”

Matthies told MichWine that the new facility is state-of-the-art, with the ability to do a full gravity flow operation and the capacity to make 30,000 cases of wine per year, although the initital goal is closer to 10,000.

Read Winemaker Shawn Walters Heads to “Forty-Five North” at MichWine and Leelanau Peninsula getting a new state-of-the-art winery: Forty-Five North in the Detroit News.