Swick Wines City Pop Pet Nat 2020

City Pop is a five-grape petillant naturel sourced from both sides of the Oregon-Washington border. The Pinot Noir comes from the Willamette Valley at 600 feet elevation on sandy loam soils and was direct pressed with no skin contact. The Verdelho, Sauvignon Blanc, Semillon, and Roussanne come from the Columbia Valley at 1,600 feet elevation, also on sandy loam, and were fermented separately with 14 days of skin maceration, foot-worked one to two times daily with no temperature control.

The 2020 vintage in Oregon was heavily shaped by wildfire smoke. Joe Swick responded by making mostly Pet Nats and direct press wines that year, avoiding extended skin contact on the Pinot. All varieties were fermented separately with native yeast before being bottled to finish fermentation in bottle. Each bottle is hand-disgorged. The only addition is a small amount of SO2 before bottling. The wine is unfined and unfiltered.

The name references City Pop, a genre of Japanese pop music from the late 1970s and 1980s. Swick Wines operates out of the Chehalem Mountains of the Willamette Valley in Oregon. Joe works exclusively with organically farmed vineyards in the colder regions of Oregon and Washington State, prioritizing higher elevation sites where grapes ripen later, retain higher acidity, and yield lower alcohol.