Forbes: Talking Natural, Biodynamic Wine With Santa Barbara Pioneer Steve Beckmen

Bio­dy­nam­ic farm­ing has been an intrin­sic part of Beck­men wines since we start­ed farm­ing this way in 2003. Wine­mak­er Steve Beck­men was inspired by the wines of var­i­ous French wine­mak­ers such as Nico­las Joly in the Loire Val­ley and the Chapouti­er Fam­i­ly in the Rhône Val­ley, who have been suc­cess­ful­ly farm­ing with bio­dy­nam­ic meth­ods since 1984 and 1990, respectively. 

Steve start­ed bio­dy­nam­ic farm­ing on Block Six, the 17 acres of Syrah grown on the sum­mit of Purisi­ma Moun­tain Vine­yard, and was thrilled with the results. The var­i­ous com­post sprays and lack of chem­i­cals in the vine­yard pro­duced a diverse and nutri­ent-rich soil, with health­i­er grapevines and extreme­ly high qual­i­ty fruit. After three years, the pro­gram was expand­ed to the entire 125 acre vineyard. 

Jill Barth, Food and Drink con­trib­u­tor for Forbes, recent­ly dis­cussed this phi­los­o­phy of wine­grow­ing and oth­er nat­ur­al wine­mak­ing prac­tices with Steve.

Click Here to Read the Forbes Article