III · Denesha Advising

Advice for vineyards and wineries.

For a small number of growers and wineries in North Carolina and the Southeast.

Hand-painted watercolor map of the eastern mountains and Piedmont, from Cincinnati and New York City south to Charleston. Asheville, Boone, Roanoke, Charlottesville and Lexington are marked, with notes on the Catawba plantings at Mount Adams and the Mother Vine, an old scuppernong on the coast.
Map of the eastern mountains and Piedmont. Illustration by James Sligh.

Choices about site, variety and timing in the vineyard show up later in the cellar, so the advice covers both.

The work is with vineyard owners, wineries, and growers. Some are just getting started. Others are established and want better wine, fewer problems, or a closer fit between how they farm and how they make wine.

The cellar

Stability, faults, fermentation, and blending. Problems are easier to settle when they are caught early.

Hybrids and natives

Variety selection for Southeastern conditions, and wine from the grapes that ripen well in a humid mountain climate.

The vineyard

Planning and site setup, organic and low-intervention growing, and recovery for vineyards in trouble.

Cost and workflow

Finding where a cellar spends more money or labor than it needs to.

Kirby on a stepladder in a winter coat and knit cap, dropping shagbark into a tall concrete egg fermenter that Chris built, draped in cheesecloth, a painted mural wall behind.
Kirby helping drop shagbark into a concrete egg Chris built, at Pleb, his former winery in the River Arts District, lost to Hurricane Helene in 2024.
A grassy alley between two rows of Petit Verdot in full summer leaf at Stone Ashe Vineyards, running downhill toward a wooded valley and blue mountains under a clear sky.
Petit Verdot at Stone Ashe Vineyards, a client whose wine Chris made until Hurricane Helene in 2024.

How the work goes

A season, start to finish.

  1. Ink sketch of a vine bud breaking open on a cane.

    Budbreak

    Looking

    A first visit, or a first read of the records. What is really happening in the vineyard and the cellar.

  2. Ink sketch of a young shoot with leaves, a tendril and a flower cluster.

    First flowers

    Deciding

    The early decisions: site, variety, the growing program, the cellar plan.

  3. Ink sketch of a cane with leaves and a cluster of small green berries.

    Fruit set

    Through the season

    Visits and calls when decisions come up.

  4. Ink sketch of a grape cluster turning color, some berries dark and some still pale.

    Veraison

    Into the cellar

    Help through fermentation and blending to the finished wine.

Sketches by James Sligh.

Terms

Four ways the work is arranged.

Remote retainer

Steady support across vineyard and winery decisions without site visits: a standing monthly conversation, questions answered in writing between, plans and documents reviewed.

from $500 a month
Regional retainer

The remote retainer, plus one visit each month to the vineyard or the cellar, for operations that want regular help in person in the vineyard and the cellar.

from $1,500 a month
On-site and ongoing

Ongoing advising with on-site support and priority access, for operations that want consistent involvement across vineyard management and winemaking.

from $2,500 a month
By the project

A defined piece of work with a beginning and an end: site planning and installation, variety and planting strategy, organic system design, vineyard recovery, or fermentation and blending.

scoped to the work

Experience

Where Chris has worked.

Chris Denesha laughing, in a dark knit beanie, in front of a painted mural wall.

Chris Denesha has worked in wine since 2007, beginning at Rodney Strong in Sonoma County, and has grown and made wine in Western North Carolina since 2014.

Most of that time has gone to learning what works in this region, from planting through fermentation. The terrain, soils and weather set real limits, and the early decisions matter most.

Ink map of the United States marking where Chris has worked: Sonoma County, California, 2007 to 2010; Puget Sound, Washington, 2010 to 2011; the Colorado Plateau, Utah, 2011 to 2012; Southern Georgia and Madison County, Florida, 2012 to 2014; and Western North Carolina, 2014 to today.
Where the work has been. Illustration by James Sligh.
2007 to 2010
Sonoma County, California
2010 to 2011
Puget Sound, Washington
2011 to 2012
Colorado Plateau, Utah
2012 to 2014
Southern Georgia and Madison County, Florida
2014 to today
Western North Carolina

Chris takes on a few clients at a time, for the long term. Write to chris@deneshafarms.com.