We are John, Helen and Mia Falcone and we love our day jobs!

During the week, John and Helen are the husband and wife winemaking team at Rusack Vineyards in Santa Barbara County. Along with our great day jobs we also have our passion project Falcone Family Vineyards. Dating back to the mid seventies, our dedication to the wine industry has culminated in planting our own small vineyard and producing our own family brand.

We have, between the two of us, several decades of winemaking experience. We both immigrated here from Napa Valley, after successful stints at Atlas Peak Vineyards (John, winemaker) and Chimney Rock Winery (Helen, assistant winemaker) and find that the pace of life in the Central and South Central Coast is well suited to our lifestyle, as winemakers and as parents. We continue to enjoy our jobs at Rusack Vineyards, and look forward to many years of working with the owners and staff, all with whom we've forged great friendships.

In 1998 we celebrated the arrival of our daughter Mia, the namesake of our family vineyard, Mia's Vineyard. Mia assists with punch-downs, yeast cultures and sorting grapes.

We have chosen to focus on two varietals at our family vineyard: Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah. We chose these for various reasons, the most important being that the family vineyard appears to be suited to the ideal manifestation of Bordeaux and Rhone varietals. Cabernet Sauvignon is such a noble varietal that to not attempt to create a stellar Cabernet Sauvignon in the Central Coast would be a missed opportunity that we did not want to regret later in our careers. With Syrah, we simply love the potential of this varietal and have tried to create a Syrah that is elegant, layered and mysterious, with aromatics that satisfy any drinker with some degree of patience and adventure.