The story of Rhys Vineyards: What happened when a software entrepreneur caught the wine bug. - By Mike Steinberger - Slate Magazine

Rhys is a classic case of one man's obsession run splendidly amok: Kevin Harvey, a tall, genial 46-year-old Silicon Valley software entrepreneur caught the wine bug in the early 1990s. It soon mutated into a Burgundy fixation, and in 1995 he decided to dabble in fantasy by planting some pinot noir vines—Burgundy's signature red grape variety— in the backyard of his Woodside, Calif., home, set in the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Imagine drilling for oil in your lawn and immediately hitting a gusher; that's essentially what happened with Harvey. He vinified the grapes in his garage, and the wine turned out to be shockingly good (he insists he had no clue his lawn could cough up such quality; he says it was "pure serendipity"). He had been thinking about starting a winery in Sonoma, but it now occurred to him that there might be gold in the mountains behind his house...

The story of Rhys Vineyards: What happened when a software entrepreneur caught the wine bug. - By Mike Steinberger - Slate Magazine