Trailblazer


Ian Mavety, of Blue Mountain Vineyard and Cellars.


Creativity is his hallmark


IanMavety and his family championed new grape varieties in the region both before and after they opened their own winery in 1992.


By Susan McIver A


month spent on an English apple orchard caused UBC pre-med student Ian Mavety to change his major to agriculture, a decision that gave the B.C. wine industry one of its most creative pioneers.


Mavety and his wife Jane and their children Matt and Christie own Blue Mountain Vineyard and Cellars in Okanagan Falls.


To the Mavety family, ‘estate' means more than the piece of land; it extends to the practice of both viticulture and wine- making by the same owner-operators. This concept taken to its fullest sets Blue Mountain apart from most North American wineries.


“I retired in 2011. At some point you have to get out of the way and let the younger generation take


over,” Mavety said.


Matt is the winemaker and manages the vineyard.


Jane, whom Ian married in 1973, has handed the operation of the tasting room and marketing and sales to Christie. “Although not officially on the payroll, I continue to work mainly doing those jobs no one else wants to do,” said Mavety.


Blue Mountain had its beginnings in 1971 when an acquaintance told Mavety to come take a look at property that was for sale near Okanagan Falls. “It was part of Charlie Oliver’s estate. He had recently passed away,” recalled Mavety.


Equipped with his new university degree and recently acquired land, Mavety set about planting 40 acres of grapes.


He had been thinking of doing an orchard before realizing the potential of wine grapes.


“When I started in the early 1970s, I had the good fortune of being able to see vineyards that were already established in the Okanagan,” Mavety said. A major feature he noticed was that the rows of vines were spaced wide enough to accommodate farm-sized vehicles.


Mavety, however, opted for narrower rows which necessitated buying tractors produced in Europe, where denser, more compact plantings are the norm.


SUSAN MCIVER


“Several years ago we did an even denser, more radical planting on eight hectares because the site demanded a different vineyard architecture,” Mavety said.


In this denser planting the row width is 1.25 m and the trellis height short, enabling specially designed tractors to go over the tops of the rows rather than between them.


“If I had to sum Ian up in a few words, I’d call him one of the most creative thinkers of the B.C. wine industry,” said wine consultant Gary Strachan. Mavety was among the first to recognize the potential for vinifera and its importance to the B.C. wine industry. He and his family championed new grape varieties in the region both before and since they opened their own winery in 1992.


Previously, they had sold premium grapes to commercial wineries. Blue Mountain makes limited quantities of complex wines from varietals including Pinot Noir, Gamay Noir, Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc and Chardonnay.


The same varietals are found in the Champagne, Burgundy and Alsace regions of France.


“Other Okanagan wineries at this time (1992) were making primarily off-dry Germanic white wines. Blue Mountain marched to its own drummer,” John Schreiner wrote.


British Columbia FRUIT GROWER • Summer 2015 21


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36