Mary Moorwood & Phillip Hart
Proprietors/Winemakers
AmByth Estate
Paso Robles, California, North America
Spotlight No. 07
Commitment to sustainability means a lot to Mary Morwood Hart and Phillip Hart. They have been dry farming in Paso Robles for 15 years, through one the worst droughts in California history. Maybe for a minute, out of compassion, they have considered sneaking out with a watering can to give their vines a little refreshment. But no, they remain committed to their conviction that the best wines are those that let nature define them. They want to make wines they like, with a sense of place, and the only way to achieve that is to let the vines adapt to that place.
The truth is that until 15 years ago, they were urbanites with a family-run custom flooring business. Phillip grew up in Wales in a family that kept a very nice wine cellar, so wine has been a part of his life since he was young (he remembers “cleaning” the wine glasses after his parents’ dinner parties). Mary found wine later, after college, when she and a few friends traveled in Europe and became accustomed to the fresh bread, cheese and local wines, which, by the way, were all made naturally. An interest in wine was the connection that brought them together. As their lives progressed, they realized that their destiny held more than just wine appreciation.
Phillip already enjoyed making beer and he thought, why not try wine? Circumstances allowed them to run their flooring business remotely, so they bought acreage in Paso Robles, packed up and moved to the countryside, where their son could grow up with rural experience, the way they had. Mary says she wakes up every day with the beauty of nature reminding her how lucky we are to be alive: “We feel integrated with nature here—more whole.”
They named their estate AmByth, which means “forever” in Welsh. For the Harts, “evolution is something we are all participating in. Survival is not going to come by way of technology. In fact, the most effective ideas come from the past.” Visiting the wine regions of Europe, they discovered they preferred wines that were produced without manipulation, which is common in Europe, and decided that this was the way they wanted to make wine too. They made the decision to farm and make wine biodynamically with Demeter certification. They planted between 7,000 and 8,000 vines, mostly Rhône varieties, exchanging their urban yard for dry-farmed land with cows, sheep, chickens, 60 or so fruit and nut trees and bees!
