Skip to content

About the Wine Writers’ Symposium

About the Wine Writers’ Symposium

ABOUT THE WINE WRITERS' SYMPOSIUM

The Wine Writers' Symposium, founded by Meadowood Napa Valley and the Napa Valley Vintners, draws top wine book authors and editors, wine magazine writers and critics, newspaper wine columnists, bloggers, and other editorial wine content creators to Napa Valley to speak, listen, debate, explore themes prevalent in contemporary wine writing and network with their peers for three days. A combination of lectures, panel discussions, group and individual writing sessions, wine tastings, and fine dining make the Symposium an unmatched career enrichment opportunity for wine writers.

MISSION STATEMENT

The mission of the Wine Writers' Symposium is to encourage, promote, and expand the wine writers’ community; to strengthen connections between emerging and established writers; and to provide a forum to discuss and explore the key issues facing an ever-evolving industry.  

DIVERSITY STATEMENT

The Wine Writers' Symposium is committed to fostering developing voices and promoting diversity, both key issues for the wine writing community.  

AUDIENCE

The ideal attendee of the Wine Writers' Symposium is a writer who has already demonstrated a degree of professional commitment to writing about wine. This demonstration can take multiple forms, and potential attendees might communicate across multiple platforms or media, but the application to the Symposium must be in the written word.

Team

Sarah Bray

Sarah Bray
Executive Director

Sarah Bray began her career in publishing at Condé Nast and SAVEUR magazine, and then later at Sotheby’s. She then stepped into a role as an international consultant and educator, working with top estates across Europe focusing on strategy and communications, before landing in Napa in 2020. As a writer, she has contributed to Food & … Continued

Read More
Maryam Ahmed

Maryam Ahmed
Program Advisor

Maryam Ahmed is the owner of Napa, CA based Maryam + Company and the co-founder of the Diversity in Wine Leadership Forum. She works at the intersection of sommeliers, chefs, activists, sustainability experts, media, and organizations focused on diversity and sustainability to design impactful educational programs and execute strategic projects in the food and wine … Continued

Read More
Matt Shirk

Matt Shirk
Web Services Manager

Matthew Shirk is a Gardening Enthusiast, Taco Aficionado and Wine Lover currently living in Napa, CA.  In his capacity as Web Services Manager for the Napa Valley Vintners, Matt is responsible for the design, construction and maintenance of a variety of web properties and takes pride in contributing to initiatives that help amplify the voices … Continued

Read More

Board

Brett Anderson

Brett Anderson
Director of Culture & Communications, Domain H. W. Harlan

To his role as senior vice president and editor in chief of Robb Report magazine, Brett Anderson applies a broad background in content creation spanning multiple industries and media. His areas of expertise encompass general business journalism, enterprise technologies, personal computing, telecommunications, the Internet, multimedia, consumer electronics, entertainment, and lifestyle. The various media in which he has … Continued

Read More
Dorothy J. Gaiter

Dorothy J. Gaiter
Senior Editor, Grape Collective

Dorothy J. Gaiter, senior editor of Grape Collective, an online wine magazine, is an award-winning journalist and author. She wrote The Wall Street Journal’s “Tastings,” from 1998 to 2010 with her husband, John Brecher. They’ve studied wine since 1973, written four books and created “Open That Bottle Night.” They’re part of Warren Winiarski Wine Writers … Continued

Read More
Amanda Harlan Maltas

Amanda Harlan Maltas
Family Director, Domain HWH

Born and raised in the Napa Valley, Amanda Harlan Maltas was immersed early on in the cultural, social, entrepreneurial, and philanthropic life of the region. Around the dinner table, discussions about winegrowing were nightly events, with her father speaking on the importance of creating, as a family, something that would last for generations. The family’s … Continued

Read More
Clive Pursehouse

Clive Pursehouse
US Editor Decanter Magazine

Clive Pursehouse worked 19 years in higher education, specifically in the sphere of sustainability and recruiting and hiring. He has been writing about the wines of the Pacific Northwest of the US for the last fifteen years. He was the Culture Editor for Peloton Magazine, a road cycling lifestyle magazine where he wrote about cycling … Continued

Read More