Our Story

In 2016, our family decided to buy a piece of property in Paonia. We had been looking for land that had water so we could grow food and have animals. We were not looking for a vineyard but we fell in love with this piece of land that borders the river to the south and is along the scenic byway to the north. We saw the potential of this property and so planted our new farm with 8 acres of Pinot Noir grapes and a 4 acre Sweet Cherry orchard. There was no house on the land so we lived in a tiny house the first year with our dog and 2 cats.

One day I was working in the vineyard with Rob Kimball, the winemaker for 5680 Winery and he said the property across the street with an old liquor store (On The Rocks) and warehouse had great potential to become a tasting room and winery. The liquor store was for sale but it was very dark (there were no windows) and not very appealing. The building needed love but the warehouse behind the store was perfect for a winery with a high ceiling and cement floor.

And so, in October of the same year, we bought the property and started renovating the building - adding windows and a garage door to take advantage of the view.

It had always been my dream to have a coffee shop so we added an espresso machine and a kitchen. We transformed the old liquor store into Root and Vine Market (our tasting room and cafe) in August of 2017.

At the same time, we started learning to make wine and Kyle, our son is the wine maker. Winemaking has become his passion. We are now on our third vintage and Qutori Wines is an award winning winery.We started with the name SkyHawk Winery and rebranded to Qutori Wines in January 2019. Qutori Wines is in the process of expanding our barrel room by 1200 square feet and creating a special tasting room for VIP and club members next to the new barrel room.

The Bennett family is very grateful for becoming part of the Paonia community. Paonia is the land of potential and we are taking every advantage of it.

We are expanding our existing 5 acre Pinot Noir vineyard by planting 3 new acres of Chardonnay and Merlot grapes. In our vineyard, we use organic practices however we are not certified organic. Our case production has increased from 550 cases for our first vintage in 2017, to 850 cases for the 2018 vintage to 1200 for the 2019 vintage. We have just purchased a new bottling line to help with increased production. We only use grapes from the West Elks AVA and Grand River AVA. In our second year of production, we won Best in Show for the Governor's Cup for our 2017 Syrah out of 250 Colorado Wines submitted. We are looking forward to many great vintages and helping to expand our Qutori brand and the brand of the West Elks AVA in the coming years.

Qutori Wines uses our estate grown Pinot Noir grapes in producing our Estate Pinot Noir, Reserve Pinot Noir, Bourbon Barrel aged Pinot Noir, and our Pinot Noir rose' wine. In addition, we have 6 acres of cherries and pears which we use to produce cherry wine, sell as local fruit and make the most amazing cherry and pear-wine pie. Our location along the West Elks Loop Scenic By-way is a distinct advantage to us. The view and scenic beauty of the North Fork Valley of the Gunnison inspired us to create Qutori Wines and Root and Vine Market.

Our Winery/Tasting room is within our cafe/coffee shop. These 2 entities work well together allowing our community to gather in one place for wine, food and coffee. Having a full service cafe is a true asset to our tasting room. With the new season, we will be developing new farm to table options to promote agritourism in our area. The North Fork Valley is said to have the most organic farms concentrated in one area in Colorado. Our business has only been open for 2 and half years.. We provide Paonia with many employment opportunies. Most of the Wineries in the West Elks Ava are only open from May-Nov. Because of our business model we remain open year round and provide year round employment. Currently we have 6 people on our payroll. During the busy part of the summer, we had18 people on our payroll. We have one person who has been with us from the beginning however 4 of our employees have become mothers in the past 18 months. I'm not sure what is in the water but these ladies have had to leave our employment to tend to their infants. We love our employees and are happy to provide jobs in our small community.