Introducing Wynne and Cody Sargeant’s Matilija Wines

Longtime Central Coast Winemaker Launches Small Label with Her Attorney-by-Day Husband

Wynne and Cody Sargeant sort grapes. | Credit: Courtesy

Cody Sargeant didn’t know much about wine when he moved from Long Beach into his dorm room at Cal Poly as a freshman back in 2010. Then he met a girl down the hall named Wynne Solomon, who hailed from the small town of Windsor in the heart of Sonoma wine country. Though just out of high school like him, she’d already decided that wine was the life for her, envisioning a future surrounded by barrels and bottles.

“She got me into wine, and continues to get me into wine,” said Sargeant of Wynne. As he studied to become a lawyer, she went on to become a professional winemaker and then, in 2022, his wife. This past March, Cody and Wynne officially became vintners together, releasing their first bottlings of Matilija Wines: an albariño from the Santa Maria Valley and a grenache grown just northwest of the Sta. Rita Hills, with more albariño and potentially mencía coming next.

“I’ve been bugging Wynne to do our own thing so that she could have an opportunity to play with different grapes and different sites, and I could have the opportunity to get my toe further into the production side,” said Cody. Explained Wynne, “I’ve always felt overwhelmed by the idea, but it’s a way to explore things outside of my main winemaking gig.”

Wynne’s professional career started at Stephen Ross and Melville Winery before she became the head winemaker at Peake Ranch in 2018. Cody, meanwhile, graduated from USC law school and worked briefly in Los Angeles before returning to Santa Barbara to be closer to Wynne. Today, he works as a land use attorney for Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, while she just left Peake after seven years to take over winemaking at Brave & Maiden.

Cody’s own interest came to a head in 2021. “I got excited enough that I picked enough grapes to make some wine in a trash can in the garage,” he explained of his pinot noir experiment. Recalled Wynne, “I’m slammed during harvest, everything is crazy, and he’s running his little ferment. At one point, the pinot noir was in our kitchen. It was a hilarious situation, but he clearly had the bug.”

The next year, Wynne was curious about the grenache at Yellow Foxtrot Vineyard, which is in Cebada Canyon just outside of the Sta. Rita Hills border. She’d helped plan the vineyard, which was first owned by Peake Ranch founder John Wagner, but then it was sold. Making her own wine provided the chance to see what the site could give.

They’d also become fond of albariño, inspired by thrilling yet affordable wines from Galicia in Spain. Wynne was able to get some in 2023 from a vineyard near the old Tepusquet Ranch. They sourced the 2024 albariño from Martian Ranch, and are eyeing some Nolan Ranch mencía for 2025.

The name refers to the Matilija sandstone formation that composes many of the mountains of this region, where the couple can often be found exploring. They’re also fans of the Matilija poppy and liked that the name was of Chumash origin.

“For us it felt like a nice homage to the beauty of Santa Barbara County,” said Wynne. “We have both done a lot of rock climbing and a lot of backpacking, and spent a lot of time in the wilderness. Not to mention it was such a big beautiful flower that would look great on a label.” (That art, by the way, was handled by their friend Danica Roosevelt.)

The production is quite tiny — just 91 cases for the first two wines, and that’s not going to change much. “My goal is to keep it small and reasonable and something we can do for fun on the side,” said Wynne. “It’s all about being able to support our community and have a venue of our own to showcase everything in Santa Barbara.”

Even though he’s got to fit all this new work in between his attorney duties, Cody is enjoying the experience. That includes the entire sales part of their operation. “It’s all completely new to me,” said Cody. “I don’t have any background in sales or the wine industry in general. It’s been really fun to just have an in to the industry.”

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Matilija Wines will be featured at the Good Land Wine Shop (4177 State St.) on July 1 at 5:30 p.m., along with Julia Weinberg’s Soul Wines. See matilijawines.com.