Join us for the 2025 AWGA Annual Membership Meeting and Mini-Conference. This one-day event will provide in-person discussion and networking with your peers in the Arizona wine industry and expand your learning. From growing to blending to marketing to being part of industry resources and support, this event is one that you definitely want to put on your calendar to attend.
REGISTER NOW IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY!
Chateau Tumbleweed is a collaboration of four friends – two husband-and-wife teams – who, after working more than 30 combined years for other Arizona wineries, recently left their “day jobs” to focus on their own project. We have a great friendship, a penchant for absurdity and complementary skills in vineyard management, winemaking, sales and administration. We crafted our first wine – only three barrels – in 2011. After three vintages of making our wine at the Four-Eight Wineworks Winemaker’s Cooperative in Camp Verde (2012-2014), we took the plunge, purchased the building we’d been eyeing for the previous year and converted it into one of Clarkdale’s first commercial wineries and tasting rooms.
We’re serious about our wines, but don’t take ourselves too seriously. We aim to rub some of this spirit off onto those we encounter in the hope that wine will one day be generally less stuffy and a lot more fun. We believe in the high-elevation growing regions of the Southwest and think wine has something to teach us if we’re willing to listen. We’re grateful to be part of this evolving industry and to finally be free to do this our way.
Founder, Kent Callaghan, on the founding of the winery:
My parents (Harold and Karen) and I planted our Buena Suerte Vineyard in May/June of 1990. Our planting happened to coincide with a vicious heat wave, one consequence of which was that Sky Harbor Airport in Phoenix was shut down for a few days. Nobody had tested passenger jets at temperatures over 120F. But it was only 105F in Elgin …Needless to say, we lost a few (thousand) vines.
This experience set the stage for what would become the Callaghan M.O. – replanting – always with an eye toward grape varieties and rootstocks better suited to our arid, windy, sun-bleached region. So, over many years, we have tossed out our original Bordeaux mindset and moved to one rooted in the Mediterranean. Spanish varieties, in particular, seem best-suited to our site – Graciano, Mourvedre, Grenache. We have found that one Bordeaux variety, Petit Verdot, provides us with a distinctive spicy/peppery/meaty blending component. Finally, Tannat, a black, burly variety from just north of the Pyrenees, has shown itself to be well-adapted to southeastern Arizona’s terroir. As for white wine, we have only one estate white now – Lisa’s – a blend of Marsanne, Roussanne, Malvasia Bianca, Clairette and Petit Manseng. The object is to produce an uncommonly nuanced white wine with great freshness and flavor "chew". With all of our wines, our primary concerns are depth of flavor and complexity. Textural considerations are secondary and best addressed by appropriate cellaring and/or food pairing.
Most of our time is spent working in the vineyard. Any discussion with any serious wine producer in the world is always dominated by viticultural details and the weather patterns of any given vintage. Wine potential is determined in the vineyard. So our winemaking approach is decidedly simplistic –no gizmos, lots of barrels (new to fifteen years old), aging on the lees and little racking.
From our first vintage in 1991, our wines have received accolades from the most respected wine writers & publications in the world: Robert Parker, Decanter, Karen MacNeil, Oz Clarke, Tom Stevenson, The Wall Street Journal.
470 N. Bisbee Ave
Willcox, Arizona 85643
Willcox, Arizona
If you have any questions please contact Jennifer Montgomery
