Aron Hess and Pam Walden met by chance in the French countryside in 1996. One quiet Sunday afternoon, she was helping a friend at a small ferme auberge six miles from Les Eyzies, when he ventured in looking for lunch. They met frequently over that summer, traveling to Paris, Bordeaux and Burgundy as he introduced her to his love of wine.
After a trip to Pamplona and an unfortunate incident with a young steer, he was sent back home to the US to recuperate and they were left with the decision of where they would continue the rest of their lives. Five months later, they moved to Oregon with everything they owned in the back of a car and a dream of making Pinot Noir.
In 2000, their dream became a reality when they produced four barrels of Pinot Noir from Phelps Creek vineyard in Hood River. The wine was bottled into ninety-seven 12-bottle cases and thus was born Daedalus Cellars. Eight years later Daedalus has grown to around 3500 cases annually.
The couple lives on their recently planted estate vineyard in the Dundee Hills with their two small boys and one large dog.
The focus of our production is Pinot Noir. We also make small amounts of Pinot Gris, Riesling, Chardonnay and Grüner Veltliner.
Sourcing from the best vineyards in the state, we work closely with the vineyard managers, diligently monitoring the vineyards throughout the growing season and bringing the fruit in at the last moment when it has reached it’s fullest flavor potential. In the winery, we monitor the fermentations and, trusting the natural elements to do what they do best, we do as little as possible.
We choose vineyard sites that ensure the natural acidity that wines require for balance, to accompany food properly and to age gracefully. We employ long cold soaks the build structure from the finest-grained tannins. Spontaneous fermentations and exclusively gravity-fed handling help to build and preserve silky, supply mouthfeel and complex flavor profile.
We recommend that you cellar our wines for five to ten years to get the most enjoyment from them. If you drink them earlier than that, we recommend that you decant them. The aeration will improve the aromatics, and the depth of flavors that you will experience.
The name Daedalus comes from Greek mythology, by way of James Joyce, who is Aron’s favorite writer. Stephen Dedalus appeared as Joyce’s alter ego in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and again, with his wings clipped, in Ulysses.
In the myth, Daedalus was an inventor, most famously of the Labyrinth at Knossos, a stylized version of which is represented in our logo. Unfortunately, he was also later imprisoned in his Labyrinth, along with his son Icarus. They managed to escape, but only Daedalus made it; Icarus succumbing to hubris. We chose the name, the myth if you will, because we see in it what we think Joyce saw: the freedom that can be gained in creative pursuit, and the cost at which it can come, especially if you don’t remain humble.
“This race and this country and this life produced me, he said. I shall express myself as I am.”
(Stephen Dedalus in Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.)
This quote that appears on our front labels refers both to Pinot Noir as a grape that is particularly expressive of its terroir, and to our approach to winemaking. We make wine because we are passionate about it. Aron makes it in the style that he likes, and if other people like it enough to buy it, that’s a bonus. We hope you enjoy our wine as much as we do.
