Nancy Freire

Nancy is a winemaker who specialises in small estate wineries. In 2004 she became the winemaker at Vidovich; she is also a consulting winemaker at Fortino,Pedrizzettiand occasionally at Kirigin.

A graduate of U.C. Santa Barbara and Santa Clara University in electrical engineering, specializing in Signal Processing, she workad at SRI International for many years. In the late 1990s she got into winemaking as a hobby along with her friend Lise Ciolino, who went on to found Montemaggiorein Sonoma.

Following the dot com bust, like many others Nancy decided to turn her hobby into a career. She took courses in winemaking and vineyard management at UC Davis and began working as assistant winemaker at wineries in Amador County and Santa Clara Valley. In 2002 she founded her own company,Vino Fino Consulting, installing and managing vineyards for a handful of private (non-winery) estates.