Garagiste Wine Festival Returns to LA June 21st: Showcasing California’s Most Exciting Micro-Production Wineries
For the 10th year in Los Angeles, America’s Best Wine Festival, features over 40+ wineries and 150+ wines, plus a seminar starring Mourvèdre wines and the winemakers who craft them
PASO ROBLES, CALIF. (PRWEB) MAY 7, 2025
America’s Best Wine Festival[1], The Garagiste Festival, returns to Los Angeles for the tenth time on Saturday, June 21st, at Glendale Civic Auditorium, with 150+ extraordinary wines and 40+ of California’s best micro-production ‘garagiste’ commercial winemakers and wineries - from Southern California to the Central Coast, Napa and points in between.
This year’s Garagiste Festival: Urban Exposure also brings back its popular tasting seminar featuring a panel of winemakers, including Jerry Ulrich (Decemil Estate), Alexandra Henkleman (Omega Road Winery), Mike Stiekema (Stiekema Wine Co.), and Larry Schaffer (Tercero Wines), renowned for their interpretations of Mourvèdre, a Spanish grape which has found its perfect second home in California. Tickets are now on sale: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/garagiste-wine-festival-10th-annual-urban-exposure-tickets-1296162259209?aff=oddtdtcreator
“We are excited to bring the Garagiste Wine Festival back to Los Angeles for its tenth year, showcasing this year’s harvest of California’s most exciting, under-the-radar wineries,” said Douglas Minnick, co-founder of the Garagiste Festival. “The festival matches up LA’s dynamic wine lovers with these remarkable winemakers, most of whom don’t have tasting rooms. A ticket to the Garagiste festival is a ticket to the best secrets of California wine country, from North to Central to South, all in one day and one location, and for about the same price as a couple of tastings in wine country.”
Along with festival favorites, this year’s first-time wineries include:
- Decemil Estate – Paso Robles: Winemaker Jerry Ulrich is pouring his 1st Vintage from Decemil’s five-acre micro estate which is planted exclusively to Grenache, Syrah, and Mourvèdre in the Willow Creek District. Practicing winemaking that pays respect to the old-world style but with a Paso Robles update, Decemil is a nod to the Rhône Valley’s Roman roots.
- Effenberger Vineyards – San Diego County: Award-winners for their Sangiovese and Sagrantino, micro-winery Effenberger is the first San Diego County Winery to participate in the Garagiste Festival. celebrating its handmade wines made from estate fruit. Dedicated to sustainable earth friendly farming, its wines are made with ‘fanatical attention to detail.’
- Flowers & Cheese –Los Angeles: Husband and wife team, Antonio and Michelle Brunetti put their heads together and combined talents during the pandemic - Antonio with cheese and Michelle with flowers, and they are now handcrafting wine the way Antonio’s Italian immigrant father did – naturally, with no additives, and with a primary focus on grape varieties grown in LA County.
- Rincon Mountain Winery –Carpinteria: Winemaker Edward Darren grew up making wine for his family and friends, so you could say wine runs in his blood. Shortly after graduating from Cal Poly with a degree in Wine and Viticulture, Edward built the winery on his family’s avocado ranch in the Paso Robles AVA, where he was born and raised, and where his vineyards are located.
Event Line-up
Garagiste Festival: Urban Exposure festivities kick off on Saturday June 21st at 11:30 am with ‘A Deep Dive Into Mourvèdre: How Place Affects Style,’ available only to VIP ticket holders.
“Mataro, Balzac Noir, Gayata, Negria are just some of the names the Spanish grape Monastrell has around the world, but here in California, where it has played a blending role in wine since the very beginning of CA winemaking, it is mostly known by its French name Mourvèdre. A mainstay of our festivals in single varietal wines, we have long been impressed by its versatility and the many beautiful interpretations crafted by festival winemakers,” continued Minnick. “We are delighted to take our VIP attendees on a deep dive into this grape, showcasing the many facets it expresses across California’s AVAs, from some of its best practitioners in California!”
The “Early Access: Rare and Reserve” tasting, where winemakers pour library, club-only or reserve wines, starts at 1:00pm, (only 150 of these Early Access tickets are available).
The Grand Tasting, the festival’s main event, is from 2-5pm, featuring 40+ winemakers and complimentary cheese & charcuterie from local wine bar Vintage Wine + Eats. Attendees will receive a keepsake crystal logo glass from Stolzle and have the opportunity to bid on the festival’s wines during a Silent Auction which supports the Garagiste Festival Scholarship fund of the California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo Wine and Viticulture Department.
Among the over 40 winemakers pouring at The Garagiste Festival: Urban Exposure are: Ascension Cellars, B2B Wines, Bon Niche Cellars, Burning Bench Wines, Caelesta Vineyards, Concur Wines, Decemil Estate Wines, DENO Wines, Dusty Nabor Wines, Effenberger Vineyards*, Etnyre Wines, Familia Hicks, Flowers & Cheese Winery*, Forgotten Union Wines, Fun Mom Wines, Greyscale Wines, Hoi Polloi, IIWII Wines, Kaleidos Winery, Monroy Wines, Montemar, Omega Road Winery, Perlegos Family Wines, Rincon Mountain Winery*, Saint K Wines, Stiekema Wine Co., Staysail Cellars, Stilson Cellars, Sunland Vintage Winery, Sycamore Ranch Valley Winery, Tercero Wines, Thomas T Thomas Vineyards, Trois le Fou Winery, Vigo Cellars, Winespread Panic Cellars, and Y.B Wine Company*.
*Pouring for the first time at the festival
Renowned for its handcrafted wines from professional artisan winemakers who make less than 1500 cases, its renegade spirit, and rules-breaking ‘no snobs allowed’ ethos, The Garagiste Festival: Urban Exposure is the only festival to provide Angelenos with the opportunity to be first to discover so many under-the-radar wines, wineries, wine styles, and grape varieties from almost every AVA in the state, from Napa to San Diego, and all regions in between including, of course, Los Angeles.
All events take place at Glendale Civic Auditorium, 1401 North Verdugo Road, Glendale, CA. There is plenty of onsite parking and easy access from the 134 and 210 freeways.
Tickets are very limited for the Garagiste Festivals and always sell out. Tickets are available: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/garagiste-wine-festival-10th-annual-urban-exposure-tickets-1296162259209?aff=oddtdtcreator
For breaking Garagiste Festival news and special discounts, sign-up for our free newsletter, The Dirt, at https://www.garagistefestival.com/garagiste-blog or follow us on Twitter (@GaragisteFest) or Facebook.
The Garagiste Festival: Urban Exposure festival is the third event of the 2025 Garagiste Festival season, preceded by the sold-out Southern Exposure in Solvang in February and sold-out Northern Exposure Festival in Sonoma in April, and will be followed by the ‘OG’ Festival in Paso Robles (November 7-8).
Sponsors include:
AgWest Farm Credit, ETS Labs, Fortis Solutions Group, Glenn Burdette, G3, Kelly Visel Photography, Laffort USA, and MWWine School. For sponsorship info, email info(at)garagistefestival.com.
The non-profit Garagiste Festivals benefit the Cal Poly SLO Wine and Viticulture program.
For more information and full Garagiste Festival: Urban Exposure schedule details, go to: https://www.garagistefestival.com/upcoming-events
About The Garagiste Wine Festival
The Garagiste Wine Festival (http://www.garagistefestival.com), named “Best of the Fests” for 2019 by Fest Forums and the ‘Best Wine Festival in the US in 2018 in USA Today’s 10Best Readers Choice Awards, is the first and only wine festival dedicated to the undiscovered and under-recognized American artisan ‘garagiste’ micro-wineries who are making some of the best, most exciting, handcrafted small-lot production wines in the world. Founded by fellow garagistes Stewart McLennan and Douglas Minnick, the Garagiste Festivals are committed to discovering the best and most innovative limited-production winemakers and promoting and showcasing them to a broad audience of discerning wine consumers. In addition to its flagship annual festival in Paso Robles, CA, the Garagiste Festival line-up includes Garagiste Festival: Southern Exposure, featuring Santa Ynez Valley garagistes; the Garagiste Festival: Urban Exposure, in Los Angeles; the Garagiste Festival, Northern Exposure, in Sonoma; winemaker dinners, a newsletter, garagiste profiles and more.
In addition to being named the US’ Best Wine Festival, the Garagiste Festival was named one of the ‘Top Nine Incredible Epicurean Vacations’ in the world by ABC News, “one of the premier wine events of the year,” by the LA Times and “Best Festival” by Sunset Magazine’s ‘Best of the West.’ The festivals are produced by Garagiste Events, a non-profit dedicated to furthering the education of future winemakers and those training for employment within the wine industry. Proceeds from the festivals support the Garagiste Festival Scholarship fund of the California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo Wine and Viticulture Department.
Garagiste (garage-east) is a term originally used in the Bordeaux region of France to denigrate renegade small-lot wine makers, sometimes working in their "garages" (anything considered not a chateau), who refused to follow the “rules,” and is now a full-fledged movement responsible for making some of the best wine in the world. The Garagiste Festivals were the first to shine a light on the American garagiste winemaker in 2011.
Media Contacts:
mWEBB Communications for The Garagiste Festivals
Melanie Webber, Melanie(at)mwebbcom(dot)com,949-307-1723
Elizabeth Johnson, Elizabeth(at)mwebbcom(dot)com, 213-713-4865
[1] The Garagiste Wine Festival was named “Best of the Fests” for 2019 by Fest Forums and the ‘Best Wine Festival in the US in 2018 in USA Today’s 10Best Readers Choice Awards.