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Empirical Wine Company
Central Coast AVA
Incredible wines inspired by winemaking from Provence, France
Founded in 2012 by brothers Rod and Philip Hamilton, Empirical Wine Company is an ultra boutique winery located in the Central Coast’s beautiful Santa Rita Hills, in the town of Lompoc. The winery actually utilizes winemaking space at Zotovich Cellars since their production is so small each year. The brothers make only two wines, a Blend de Provence (red blend of Grenache and Syrah) and a Grenache Blanc, both taking inspiration from the Provence winemaking region of France.
The Hamilton brothers were inspired to get into the wine industry after spending many enjoyable weekends wine tasting in the Santa Barbara County area. Philip Hamilton had a science background and furthered his education by taking winemaking correspondence courses at the heralded UC Davis. He would become the winemaker for Empirical Wine Company. He still holds a ‘day job’ as a Manager of Technical Support for Wyatt Industries in Santa Barbara and currently lives in Buellton. Rod Hamilton, on the other hand, is an award-winning independent film producer in Los Angeles, whose most recent project, Po, is set for a November 2016 release. He provided the financing to source the initial fruit from the Santa Ynez Valley when Empirical Wine Company was just starting out.
Empirical Wine Company currently sources fruit from the Happy Canyon of Santa Barbara AVA, located in the very east end of the Santa Ynez Valley. This bucolic canyon of large horse ranches and hillside vineyards presents a quiet and thoughtful contrast to the typical bustling wine routes and offers the perfect setting for growing Grenache and Syrah grapes. With only a handful of active wineries and vineyards in the region, Happy Canyon is a bit under the radar, but is quickly showing its promise as a world-class wine producing region.
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