Our vineyard, circa 1900

An Introduction
Our Story
Colorado Wine

An Introduction
BookCliff Vineyards is located in  "the Vinelands," a region east of Palisade, Colorado, where grapes were grown at the turn of the century. Situated just west of the DeBeque Canyon, across from the Colorado River and underneath the BookCliff escarpment, our vineyards benefit from evening winds that prevent frost and provide moderate growing temperatures. Our wine is 100% Colorado grown. We apply sustainable farming practices, and minimize the use (once in our six years of operation) of herbicides or pesticides are used. 

As the owners and operators of BookCliff Vineyards, we (John Garlich and Ulla Merz, husband and wife) started in the winemaking business in 1999. 

Our Story
We developed a taste for wine in the late '70s when we got together with friends to explore wines. Our passion for wine grew more serious when John dug a wine cellar in our basement by hand and planted vines in our backyard in Boulder. We soon had a cellar of more than 200 bottles of wine and John made his first Zinfandel in 1981 from Californian grapes.

We also have a passion for backpacking and hiking. This passion took us to Moab, Canyonlands and Lake Powell in the spring. On one of our trips in 1994, we stopped in Palisade to visit the local wineries and fell in love with the romance of the vineyard and winery. That same year, we attended a seminar on Colorado grape growing, which was offered during the annual Winefest in Palisade. Armed with facts and information, we started looking for land and bought 10 acres of peaches in the summer of 1995.

We are both engineers by training. John is a structural engineer who has worked in engineering and sales at a precast company and Ulla is a software project manager. Farming was not our background. We learned quickly by doing and also through our neighbors who grow peaches and the advice from people in the Colorado wine industry.

We live in Boulder and work in the vineyard during the weekends. The winery is located in Boulder in our basement, which is federally licensed as a winery. We still sell two-thirds of our grape crop to other Colorado wineries and make wine from the rest as BookCliff Vineyards. 

Over the coming years, we will gradually increase our wine production with a focus on producing quality grapes to make quality wine. Next time you're in the Palisade area, please come by and visit our vineyard. 

Colorado Wine
Colorado's Rocky Mountains are blessed with warm days, cool nights and low humidity--perfect conditions for cultivating wine grapes with the complex character and chemistry needed to produce award-winning wines.
--The Colorado Wine Industry Development Board

Winemaking began on Colorado's Western Slope over 100 years ago. During Prohibition, these early vineyards were uprooted and replaced with orchards. Modern vineyards have reestablished themselves on the Western Slope and across Colorado, and winemaking is again flourishing. Western Slope vineyards are at elevations ranging from 4,500 to 6,000 ft., among the highest altitude vineyards in the world. According to the New York Times, in this area of Colorado, a dry climate helps prevent vine disease, intense summer sunlight gives grapes good flavor and color, and low nighttime temperatures promote acid retention, which is regarded as a key to premium winemaking.

Colorado winemaking has grown in both popularity and numbers, tripling since 1990. Today, Colorado has an estimated 450 acres of vineyards, and more than 563 tons of grapes are harvested each year in Colorado.