This winery focused on sparkling wines was established in 1999 by Gerry McConnell and Dara Gordon. As life partners, they shared a commitment to rural living and a vision for the sustainable and responsible growth of their community by producing the highest-quality wines from grapes farmed organically along the Bay of Fundy.

With expertise from Canada and the world’s top oenologists, led by its chief innovator and head winemaker, Jean-Benoit Deslauriers, Benjamin Bridge has been unwavering in the singular pursuit of reflecting its precise set of growing conditions as transparently as possible.

Gerry and Dara’s twin daughters Ashley & Devon McConnell-Gordon now lead the small family-like team. As stewards of lands located in Mi’kma’ki, the ancestral and unceded territory of the Mi’kmaq First Nations, the team has carefully and meticulously grown Benjamin Bridge from a micro-boutique project into a dedicated sparkling wine house.

Benjamin Bridge‘s approach to sustainability starts by confronting the fact that growing grapes is a form of monoculture. To address this problem, they allow wild plants to mature and cycle through succession, compost all pomace waste from harvest, care for an apiary with pollinator gardens and grow culinary gardens relying on a no-till strategy and perennial plantings.

The Gaspereau River runs from east to west within the Valley, spilling into the Bay. The upper Gaspereau Valley is narrow and somewhat sheltered, and is tilted westward, significantly capturing more sun. Ambient daily temperatures during the growing season are heightened by this positioning, creating a collecting point for optimal heat absorption benefiting the Benjamin Bridge vineyards.

These moderated temperatures allow for the development of delicate aromatics and the retention of natural acidity in the grapes, so vital to the creation of top-flight sparkling wines made in the classic style. The prolonged growing season due to its location enables the grapes to achieve full phenological maturity, critical to the texture and complexity of these sparkling wines.

Benjamin-Bridge‘s winemaking process complements the care given to their grapes. Starting with wild fermentation, they practice no chaptalisation, so that the wine expresses both the terroir and the growing season. Mallolactic fermentation has been allowed since 2015, and the storage and fermentation vessels for the base wines include stainless steel, neutral 225L French Oak barrels, 600L Demi-Muids, and more recently 1900L concrete eggs.

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