A Charlevoix Newcomer

Folklor Wine & Cider prioritizes the farming aspect of wine-making as it works to achieve organic certification
8
Babinska shares information about Folklor’s wine with her guests.

Derrick Vogel and Izabela Babinska, the husband-and-wife duo who founded Charlevoix’s Folklor Wine & Cider in 2023, are blazing their own trail on the Michigan wine scene. With their “vineyard first” philosophy — focusing on the health of their soil, plants, and ecosystem — they create minimal-intervention wine and hard cider that reflects the landscape.

But as focused on the farming aspect of wine-making as Vogel and Babinska are, it wasn’t always about agriculture for the northern Michigan couple.
Before heading to Charlevoix, the couple was residing downstate and working in careers far removed from agriculture — Vogel in laboratory science, and Babinska in fundraising and grant development.

“When we moved to northern Michigan (in 2016), we were already interested in wine and wanted to figure out how to get some hands-on experience,” Babin-ska recalls. “We started volunteering and working for some of the local wineries in the Tip of the Mitt AVA. Through that process, Derrick did a viticulture and enology certificate program and an apprenticeship.”

Folklor Wine & Cider owners Izabela Babinska and Derrick Vogel take a moment to enjoy the vineyards.

In 2018, the couple launched Phenology Vine Care, a vineyard management company, to assist local farms in caring for their vineyards. “We did that for four years,” she says. “Through the process of being in the vineyards, we realized we wanted to farm in a really specific way, and we were really interested in selecting different grape varietals that we thought would reflect our northern Michigan climate. That led us to wanting to purchase our own land and plant our own vineyards.”

The couple’s 52-acre property, at nearly 800 feet above sea level, was purchased from a multigenerational family that had been growing apples, cherries, and pears. While all the cherry trees had been removed, several hundred apple and pear trees remained. “That’s where the cider piece came into the equation. We initially were looking specifically for a vineyard site, but the cider just made so much sense, and when we saw the orchard, we fell in love with it,” Babinska says.

Vogel and Babinska planted their first 2 acres of grape vines in 2021 and added more in 2023. They grow cold hardy hybrid grapes such as L’Acadie Blanc, Marechel Foch, and Osceola Muscat, as well as Zweigelt, Riesling, and Gruner Veltliner, which are European varietals.

“We’ve been really intentional about planting different grape varieties that we can blend together to create a really balanced wine, rather than having to manipulate the grapes in the cellar after we pick them,” Babinska says. She notes that they’re currently working on an organic certification that they hope to have within the next few years.
The couple is also striving for another goal: 100 percent estate production. “Our estate vines are so young, so we’re just starting to produce our first estate vintages,” she says. “In the meantime, we’re sourcing grapes from local growers that are as close to the farm as possible.”

The proprietors say they’re intentional about planting different grape varieties at their vineyard so they can blend flavors to create balanced wines. Based on Babinska’s Polish heritage, when deciding to name the winery the pair dropped the e in folklore to come up with Folklor, the Polish version of the word.

Customer favorites include their two Rieslings, and the most popular of those is Row Boat. “It really adapts to place. I think Michigan Rieslings are really distinctive, and really stand out.”
Folklor’s ciders are also an expression of the land. “Because our orchards are so old and hadn’t been managed in years, the trees produce biannually. We take what we have and blend it together. That way, the trees and the vines kind of guide what the final product is going to be.”

While Away, a canned hard cider, has become Folklor’s flagship and is available in retail outlets throughout the state. “I call that my lawn-mowing cider,” Babin-
ska says. “It’s nice, light, and bright. It’s a little bit acidic and made from a blend of apples from our farm.”

The popular Field Blend Perry, a cider made from pears, is “not something we thought we’d ever get to make, but when we bought the property, it had a couple hundred old pear trees,” she says. “Folks really enjoy that because it’s something unique and different.”
Guests can drop in year-round at the tasting room to sample the various offerings and order from a snack menu featuring local Michigan favorites. For those who want to learn more about Folklor (the Polish spelling of folklore), their innovative farming practices, and their products, Babinska suggests booking a farm tour, offered from May through October.

The Folklor owners planted their first 2 acres of grape vines in 2021 and they’re now starting
to enjoy the fruits of their labors

“Derrick and I personally do all the tours. We take folks out in the vineyard and they get to taste the wine right alongside the grapes and apple trees, which is how I like to drink wine. It’s the most romantic part of wine.”
This coming spring, Folklor will launch a wine club, offering members releases of their smaller-batch estate wines.

“It feels like such an exciting time in the Michigan wine industry,” Babinska says. “We have an amazing legacy of folks who have been doing it for so many years before us, and we’re at the point where we have a really good amount of information about what types of grapes grow well here, and we’re able to kind of build on that.

“For us,” she says, “(it’s about) prioritizing farming, working toward organic certification, and (emphasizing) our vineyard-first mentality, which we try to show through how we run our business, how we make our wines, and how we invite folks to participate in that by coming out into the vineyard with us. It’s something we’re trying to make a core of our business.”



 

Facebook Comments