About Birichino Winery
Birichino sits on the corner of Cedar and Church in downtown Santa Cruz, a block west of Pacific Avenue, which makes it one of the few Santa Cruz Mountains names you can reach on foot rather than up a switchback road.
Alex Krause and John Locke founded it in 2008, bringing four decades of combined winemaking between them from California, France and Italy. The house style leans on old vines, much of the fruit coming from own-rooted, family-farmed sites planted in the 19th and early 20th centuries, with a handful the winery cheerfully dates to the late disco era.
The cellar approach is deliberately hands-off: native fermentations, stainless or neutral barrels, little racking or fining, and no filtration where they can avoid it. The range is wide enough to be daunting, which is what the rotating themed flights are for.
Tastings run inside and out, and the room takes walk-ins, though booking ahead is offered for anyone who would rather not chance it.