Williams Selyem

Burt Williams grew up on the Russian River and, by the winery's account, made his first wine in his early 20s from a neighbor's Zinfandel vineyard while working as a pressman. Ed Selyem was a family friend and the wine buyer for Speer's Market in Forestville. The pair first vinified Zinfandel sourced from Lee Martinelli Sr.'s Jackass Hill Vineyard, and Joe Rochioli went on to sell them Pinot Noir. Burt designed the inaugural 1979 labels and named the venture Hacienda Del Rio after his home in Forestville's Hacienda Bridge section. The two worked out of a leased two-car garage on River Road in Fulton, foot-treading grapes in a rigged-up dairy tank; after an ATF agent and the Hacienda Winery got wind of the operation, they renamed the winery and got bonded. Westside Road grower Howard Allen later offered to put up a simple winery on his property, just across the road from Rochioli Vineyard.

• Designer friend Graham Mackintosh created a later label that the winery describes as looking like the title page of a book, a nod to Burt's day job
• The allocation list began in 1987 as a handwritten register of names because demand had exceeded supply
• By the winery's account, the 1991 Summa Vineyard Pinot Noir was the first California Pinot to sell for $100 a bottle
• Ferrington debuted in 1992, followed by Hirsch and Coastlands in 1994

Burt Williams and Ed Selyem sold the brand in 1998 to longtime List members John and Kathe Dyson, and Bob Cabral stepped in as winemaker following the sale. After the sale, Burt Williams (d. 2019) grew grapes for Williams Selyem at his Morning Dew Ranch Vineyard in Mendocino County. John Dyson, a Cornell-trained agriculturist, founded Millbrook Vineyards & Winery in the Hudson Valley and co-developed the Smart-Dyson trellising system. Jeff Mangahas joined in 2011, spent a year learning alongside Cabral and stepped into the head winemaker role in 2014. The Faiveley family, whose domaine in Nuits-Saint-Georges was founded in 1825, purchased a minority stake in 2021 and assumed majority ownership in 2024. As of September 2026 the winery's People page lists John Dyson as CEO.

• As of September 2026 the winery's site lists Erwan Faiveley as Chairman, François Faiveley as Proprietor, John Dyson as CEO, Jeff Mangahas as Vice President and Director of Winemaking, Chris Bowland as Director of Viticulture, Michael Thomas as Chief Financial Officer and Philip O'Conor as Vice President of Sales and Marketing
• Erwan Faiveley took the helm of Domaine Faiveley in 2005; his first taste of Williams Selyem was a 1995 Rochioli while he was living in Philadelphia in his early twenties
• Chris Bowland planted Williams Selyem's first Estate blocks in 2002 while at Lloyd Vineyard Management, and today oversees the Estate vineyards and a number of grower sites
• Michael Thomas and Philip O'Conor both joined the winery in 2025

Williams Selyem cultivates four Estate vineyards, all in the Russian River Valley: Williams Selyem Estate Vineyard, Drake Estate Vineyard, Lewis MacGregor Estate Vineyard and Saitone Estate Vineyard. John Dyson acquired Litton Vineyard and renamed it Williams Selyem Estate, and that vineyard now surrounds the Estate winery. Drake Estate is a former apple orchard on the banks of the Russian River, and Lewis MacGregor Vineyard is on Eastside Road; the winery says Lewis MacGregor was acquired in 2014 when its vines were nearly 20 years old. Saitone, planted in 1895, is a dry-farmed field blend of Zinfandel and more obscure varieties. The Press Democrat reported in June 2024 that the Dysons had purchased four vineyards with 135 current planted acres. The remainder of the single-vineyard bottlings come from longtime grower partners.

• The Dysons have owned Vista Verde Vineyard in San Benito on the Central Coast since 1990; its six-acre nursery supplies vines used to replant the Estate vineyards, offered to grower partners at cost
• The winery names Rochioli, Hirsch, Saitone, Bacigalupi, Heintz and Allen as the growers who helped put single-vineyard Russian River Valley Pinot Noir on the map
• Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon began with the 2016 vintage from a Beckstoffer vineyard in Rutherford, followed in 2019 and 2020 by Beckstoffer Missouri Hopper and Beckstoffer To Kalon in Oakville
• Other grower vineyards listed on the site include Rochioli Riverblock, Olivet Lane, Coastlands, Precious Mountain, Terra de Promissio, Ferrington, Savoy and Weir

The winery says it produces nearly 30 vineyard-designated wines. The Fall 2026 release completes the 2024 vintage with vineyard-designate Pinot Noirs, alongside vineyard-designate Chardonnays, Zinfandels and Cabernet Sauvignon. The Eastside Road Neighbors Pinot Noir is sourced from the Calegari, Foss and Lewis MacGregor Estate vineyards. Appellation and neighborhood bottlings shown on the site's trade page include Russian River Valley Pinot Noir, Sonoma County Pinot Noir, Westside Road Neighbors Pinot Noir and an Unoaked Chardonnay. Wines are released to List members in the spring and the fall, and they are never commercially available for less than their original release price.

• Wine Spectator placed the 2023 Eastside Road Neighbors Pinot Noir at No. 4 on its Top 100, the Press Democrat reported in November 2025, quoting senior editor James Molesworth that the wine "captures the floral-laced purity of the vintage"
• Approximately 95 percent of the wines are sold directly to List members; the remaining 5 percent goes at full retail price to select restaurants and fine wine merchants
• There is a Wait List for new members, with wait times typically ranging from a few months to a year
• Members and their guests can taste at the Estate by appointment only

Williams Selyem traces its methods to Burt Williams, who, by the winery's account, worked with antique dairy tanks and a 1905 basket press and developed a slow, low-intervention approach. Antique stainless-steel dairy tanks, wide, shallow, open-topped and temperature controlled, are still at the center of the process and are used for foot treading. The cellar is built around gravity flow, and dome-topped stainless steel vessels allow wine to be transferred with inert gas instead of pumps. The winery cites partial whole-cluster fermentations and no fining or filtering among the Burgundian practices it shares with Domaine Faiveley. Its proprietary yeast culture, called Mother, was born in 1984 and is regrown each year from a single cell.

• Jeff Mangahas works from a modern facility near downtown Healdsburg; barrels then age at the Russian River Valley Estate, where the wines are bottled
• By the winery's account, Williams Selyem and Domaine Faiveley combined are Tonnellerie François Frères's largest customer
• Mangahas vinifies just 200 cases at a time, according to the winery
• The Estate winery on Westside Road is cut into the hillside, topped with a living roof of native grasses and supported by solar power

Primary sources (producer's own site): https://www.williamsselyem.com/history/, https://www.williamsselyem.com/heritage/, https://www.williamsselyem.com/people/, https://www.williamsselyem.com/vineyards/, https://www.williamsselyem.com/winemaking/, https://www.williamsselyem.com/experience/, https://www.williamsselyem.com/wine-releases/fall-2026-release/, https://www.williamsselyem.com/faq/, https://www.williamsselyem.com/trade-media/, https://www.williamsselyem.com/acquire/. Secondary sources: The Press Democrat (June 11, 2024), Wine Spectator (June 3, 2024), The Press Democrat (November 18, 2025). Where the producer's site and a secondary source disagree, the producer's site governs. Last verified 2026-09-23