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Urban winery to debut in Frederick

Frederick Cellars set to open in Everedy Square

Friday, Sept. 22, 2006

Click here to enlarge this photo Bill Ryan⁄The Gazette ‘‘I think we are going to get a different kind of wine taster here,” says Charles Daneri, co-owner of Frederick Cellars in downtown Frederick.

But within a few weeks, owners Charles Daneri and his wife, Emily Williams, plan to open Frederick Cellars in a century-old, thick-brick-walled former icehouse at 221 N. East St. in Everedy Square.

‘‘It’s a wonderful use of the property,” said landlord Bert Anderson, a developer who began renovating Everedy Square, then a blighted warehouse and factory district, in the 1970s. ‘‘As far as I know it will also be the first urban winery in the state.”

It will also be one of only about 10 such wineries in the nation, according to Kevin Atticks, executive director of the Maryland Wineries Association.

A neighboring Everedy retailer, Kim Madden, runs the Frederick Basket Co., selling locally grown wines and beers, mostly to gift-buyers.

‘‘I think the winery is going to bring another kind of visitor into the neighborhood,” Madden said. ‘‘This is a very creative use of that space.”

Daneri’s business plan is based on the concept that many people like visiting wineries but are not likely to drive far into the countryside to do so.

‘‘I think we are going to get a different kind of wine taster here,” Daneri said.

Selling wine at the downtown location will give Frederick Cellars the kind of direct access to customers not afforded by large distributors that tend not to carry local producers.

Daneri and Williams, former computer software consultants from Catonsville, are busy putting the final touches on the store’s long wine-tasting bar illuminated by a dozen hanging cone-shaped fixtures. The bar will share the ground floor with the winery itself, to be visible through a glass partition. The space also includes a conference room for business meetings and a caterer’s kitchen.

The couple’s venture comes with a prize-winning wine master, Bob Lyon. Lyon recently sold his business, Catoctin Vineyards of Brookeville, to Daneri and Williams for an undisclosed price. Daneri did not disclose the purchase price or his startup costs for Frederick Cellars. In March, however, he told The Gazette that he had invested $80,000 from his savings and taken out $400,000 in small-business loans secured by his home and savings to get started with his first vineyards three years ago.

The crusher, pumps, filters and French oak barrels used by Lyon at Catoctin Vineyards are to be installed at Frederick Cellars. After 24 years of making Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon, Lyon has decided to segue into retirement at age 68 by helping Fredrick Cellars make its first wines. Daneri plans to truck in grapes from his two vineyards, Mountain Creek Vineyards in Middletown and Harness Creek Vineyards in Annapolis. Initial production will be about 40,000 bottles a year.

Frederick Cellars may help overcome what Madden describes as ‘‘a bit of an attitude” that some Americans have about local wines, thinking they can’t stack up against California and European wines.

‘‘People should remember that Maryland was one of the original 13 colonies and that they made wine in Virginia when Virginia was still a colony,” Madden said.