Forge Cellars

Forge Cellars is a wine producer on the southeastern shore of Seneca Lake. Managing partner Rick Rainey came to the Finger Lakes through Philadelphia’s restaurant industry with the ambition of owning a winery.

Vineyard work uses cover crops, compost and hand cultivation beneath the vines, while winemaking involves hundreds of separate small French barriques and more than a dozen vineyards. Spontaneous fermentation proceeds in tiny lots, and slow indigenous yeast fermentations mean movement toward bottling waits until the summer after the vintage. Its wines include bone-dry Riesling, Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Cabernet Franc from Seneca Lake, alongside Classique bottlings intended to express each vintage and explore the terroir of east Seneca Lake.