Philip Carter Winery
April 20, 2024. Today we find ourselves toward the western end of Interstate 66 and Fauquier County at the Philip Carter Winery in Hume. It’s early afternoon in the bright sun of late spring, and I am on a tour of the property with Vic the guide, standing in their rows of Cabernet Franc where a couple of leaves are unfolded on each cane. I reckon they were at EL-9, about three weeks ahead of growing schedule. The lyre trellises stand like scaffolds waiting for the vines to climb them. There are 15 acres under vine at Hume and an additional acre is to be added this year. The 25-year old Cab Franc vines are a holdover from the old Stillhouse Farm that Philip Carter Strother, owner of the winery, bought in 2008. Philip Carter Winery is a fictitious name under Stillhouse Vineyards LLC. The Strother family also owns Valley View Farm about ten miles away. The farm has some grapes under vine but is focused on other fruit and orch...