Brick & Mortar
About
Founded in 2011, brick & mortar focuses on single-vineyard chardonnay, pinot noir and syrah, from select high-elevation Napa, Sonoma, and Mendocino vineyards. Since our beginning, we have expanded our production, adding methode champenoise sparkling, vin pétillant-style rosé, and a successful line of canned wines. Our wines are elegant, balanced, and food-friendly: the European wine drinker’s California wine.
About Our Winemakers
MATT IACONIS, FOUNDER & WINEMAKER
Matt Iaconis has always had an affinity for hard work and getting his hands dirty. A three-sport athlete in high school, Matt went to U.C. Davis to study aeronautical engineering and play football. But when he took the popular winemaking elective class, his dreams of being an astronaut got replaced by visions of grapes.
After graduating with his viticulture and oenology degree in 2008, Matt apprenticed at wineries in Australia, New Zealand, Italy and most of all Burgundy, where he fell in love with pinot noir and chardonnay and developed his winemaking approach.
Matt’s time with renowned Napa winery Antica clarified his vision of making premium wines from hillside vineyards. He founded Brick & Mortar in 2011, and soon after, began to earn accolades and placements at Michelin-starred restaurants like The French Laundry and Meadowood. Fall 2020 will be his 12th vintage.
Matt’s primary responsibilities include sourcing fruit, grower relationships, and oversight or participation in all aspects of the winemaking process, from brix to bottles.
In his spare moments, Matt enjoys running with his yellow lab Jimmy, coaching his son’s little league sports, and rooting for the Dodgers.
ALEXIS IACONIS, CO-OWNER & SOMMELIER
A lifetime artist and gourmet, Alexis won a blue ribbon for her chocolate chip cookies at the county fair at age 11, and a scholarship to art school at age 18, before embarking on her current food & wine career at one of the nation’s top cooking schools, The Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York.
During an internship at Auberge du Soleil in Napa Valley, Alexis discovered wine, and moved out to California in 2007 to pursue a career in the industry. Since then, she has earned her Certified and Advanced Sommelier credentials from the Court of Master Sommeliers.
Before joining Brick & Mortar full time in 2019, Alexis held managerial positions at Copain Wines in Healdsburg, Hyde de Villaine in Napa, as well as sommelier at the Michelin three-star Restaurant at Meadowood (where she met an aspiring young winemaker named Matt Iaconis).
Alexis’s primary responsibilities include consulting on winemaking decisions, running the wine club and other customer care, and industry and distributor relationships and sales.
In between co-running their business and raising three kids, Alexis occasionally gets to read a book or dig out her oil paints.