Hi!

I’m Brandi—one of the owners of Levure. I’m the beverage director and sommelier at Elvie’s, co-creator of Good Bar, and curated the Mayflower’s wine list. This shop has been my dream for some time and I’m very excited to share it with you!

Why a retail shop?

My favorite part of a wine list is finding the balance between nerdy and approachable. Offering the ability to try something from somewhere and someone new that has a similar profile to what is familiar. I really wanted to bring that to a retail setting, where the focus is discovering natural wine and having easier access to learn about the bottle you’re drinking.

What is natural wine? Why is it the focus?

Natural wine begins with farming that is regenerative, organic, or biodynamic, has minimal intervention in the winemaking process, and is made by people that are passionate about what they make and why they make it. A little history—I had no idea this style of winemaking and farming even existed pre 2020. A friend that really believes in what natural wine is and who it impacts walked me through wines they were excited about every time we got together. As I read books and dove deeper into the tech sheets of natural producers and in general just enjoyed the vibrancy of the wines—I reached a point where I couldn’t go back.

After realizing how closely natural wine aligned with the sourcing and execution for the food and bar side of Elvie's we decided to change the wine program to match. Natural / Low Intervention wine supports small producers and is made to best represent the vineyards and farmers it started with. It took nearly 2 years of working with our incredible local brokers and chipping away at bringing in new wines to reach a fully natural wine list at Elvie’s. Another 2 years later, there are more available to the state than we can fit in our shop at once!