Blasted Church Vineyards has been ranked as the second-most decorated winery in British Columbia and third-most decorated winery in Canada at the recent WineAlign National Wine Awards of Canada judging. The winery received a total of 24 medals which included 2 Platinum, 6 Gold, 5 Silver, and 11 Bronze medals. The Platinum medals were awarded to the 2019 Big Bang Theory and the 2019 Cabernet Franc which places those wines in the top 1.4% of the 2075 wines entered into this year’s competition.
Evan Saunders, Winemaker, and Tanya Martin, General Manager, were both thrilled when they received the results. “It’s an honour to be ranked so high nationally,” said Martin. “We have put so much into our vineyard and winemaking over the past two decades and it’s fantastic to see it recognized.”
Saunders is also inspired and proud of the recent accolades from WineAlign. “It is so amazing to see these wines distinguished for their quality,” he said. “Being judged in a blind tasting is confirmation the awards are based on quality alone.” Saunders and Viticulturist John Bayley have had the most direct influence in the direction of the wine quality. Saunders started at Blasted Church in 2014 as Assistant Winemaker and has introduced many leading-edge winemaking techniques, including small batch productions in clay vessels and managing the oak program to create a more refined and complex style of wine production.
That quality has been demonstrated to be consistent across vintages and styles of wines. The two Platinum winners were a red blend and a red single-varietal while the gold medals were awarded to both blends and single-varietal wines. Although both Platinum wines were from the 2019 vintage, the gold medal wines were chosen from a diverse set of vintages from 2017 to 2020.