Jim and Leslie Ward

3890 Los Arabis Drive ~ (510) 406-5680

Prior to 1990, when the Wards bought their property in Happy Valley, the downward sloping field adjacent to their home was a barn and a horse ranch for Arabian horses. Those same horses now adorn the label of their Pinot Noir after 1500 vines were planted in the perfect conditions of our Lafayette climate: hot days, cool nights and fog. “The delicate skins of the Pinot Noir grape don’t break in this microclimate,” says Leslie as she shows me row after row of perfectly tended, mature vines.

She and her husband Jim, a former Navy commander, manage a construction company that builds schools, fire stations, and even the new Lafayette police station, but they have still been known to drive an ATV, put in irrigation lines, and dig ditches throughout their vineyard. They also have a beautiful “tasting room” that looks out over rolling hills, hidden from the road, but a verdant part of our Happy Valley landscape.

The grapes are handpicked and transported to Urban Legends Winery on the former Naval Air Station in Alameda where they are crushed and bottled under the careful guidance of Allison Schneider, the Wine Maker. Jim and Leslie and several other early Lamorinda winegrowers founded the Lamorinda Winegrowers Association in 2005.