Après - Season 1 Spring | Summer 2022

There is so much to love about The Little Nell. As general manager of this boutique hotel, I am privileged to make connections with the myriad professionals who make up our team, as well as the cross-section of guests who come from all over the world. There’s something so special—something indefinable—about the way you feel when you’re here, thanks to the thoughtful hospitality, knowledgeable team, and magical setting.

Reflecting on the rich history of this setting, our story begins with our days as a former hunting ground for the Utes and then a miners’ den and railroad depot during Colorado’s silver boom. Later, this site was home to a bar called Little Nell’s before it became a ski-in/ski-out hotel in late 1989.

The Little Nell has always been about big dreams and brave pursuits, appealing to those seeking a better life for themselves and others. In considering why you, our guests, come here, we often return to the idea of time, our most valuable resource.

Uniquely situated where culture and nature converge, we define The Little Nell as a place where luxury is time well spent. And we’re grateful to be spending it with you.

I’m excited to introduce Après, our new in-room media channel, highlighting the people, places, and stories that make Aspen and The Little Nell unique. We hope you’ll enjoy these stories après your Aspen adventure and think fondly on your time with us when you return home.

Return Transformed,

Jonathan Fillman General Manager

The

Little Nell

Welcome to Aspen

CEO & PUBLISHER

Jason Cutinella

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Ara Laylo

EDITORIAL DIRECTOR

Lauren McNally

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CREATIVE SERVICES

Marc Graser VP Global Brand Storytelling

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Alpine Bloom

In this ode to summer in Aspen, a photographer captures the spirit of the season.

Art Beyond Walls

Discover the Aspen Art Museum’s lesser-known efforts to serve the artists and art lovers in its own backyard.

Highest Quality

Aspen’s high-end dispensaries are a far cry from the head shops of yesteryear.

First Growth, New Growth

Down the Line

A pioneer in women’s freeride mountain biking, Camila Nogueira is on the road less traveled.

The Giving Trees

A certified forest therapy guide explains forest bathing, the art and practice of slowing down. 40

Easy Rider

Race car driver and part-time Aspen resident Jimmie Johnson shares his favorite scenic drives in the valley.

One of Napa Valley’s most venerable wine producers passes the torch to the next generation.

108

Taste Testing

Chef-restaurateur Mawa McQueen dishes on the healthy, no-frills fare at her beloved Aspen eateries. 116

Treasure Hunting

Living History

A husband-and-wife design duo discuss their passion for historic preservation.

134

X Marks the Spot

For its 75th anniversary, Aspen Skiing Company debuts a new concept, ASPENX. 138

Ajax at Home

Take a piece of Aspen home with you by recreating this crowd favorite from Ajax Tavern.

140

Salud to Summer

Wine director Chris Dunaway recommends perfect pours for the summer season.

142

The owner of The Little Bird reflects on 15 years of dressing the stylish women of Aspen. 124

Off the Road

With The Little Nell’s array of summer excursions, you choose your own adventure.

A quintessential summer moment captured by photographer and AETHER co-founder Jonah Smith.

Episode 01: Art Beyond Walls

Follow 2021 Aspen Art Museum artist fellow Lara Whitley to a handful of places that have inspired and fueled her contemplative installation art.

For more episodes from Season 1 of Après TV, tune in online and inroom at The Little Nell, and be on the lookout for next season of Après for more stories of Aspen and the Roaring Fork Valley.

thelittlenell.com

TV

by

Image

Tamara Susa

Off duty with race car driver Jimmie Johnson.

Image by Kevin Keller

the Line

A pioneer in the nascent discipline of women’s freeride mountain biking, Camila Nogueira is on the road less traveled.

In the spring of 2021, 27-year-old Camila Nogueira traveled from Aspen to join a small group of mountain bikers in the Mars-like landscape of the Utah desert. They were there for the second annual Red Bull Formation, a women’s-only event dedicated to freeride mountain biking, a growing discipline in which riders build and ride trails that include challenging features such as jumps and drops. While cross-country and downhill mountain bike racing award speed, freeride focuses on amplitude, tricks, and style.

Down

Text by Tess Weaver Strokes

Images by Katie Lozancich and Tamara Susa

An avid mountain biker from an early age, Camila Nogueira says she sees more women out on the trails in Aspen than in Argentina, where she grew up.

During the week-long progression session in Virgin, Utah, Nogueira and her fellow riders—eight of the world’s best female freeriders—built their own lines: shoveling, watering, and packing the desert’s red dirt into technically difficult trail features. They also practiced riding each other’s lines, including everything from hip jumps to gap jumps over canyons to exposed, steep chutes. On the final day, riders combined everything they’d been practicing by attempting top-to-bottom runs. Nogueira, the event’s first Latin American participant, was one of two who succeeded.

“She’s uniquely talented at the mental side of the sport,” says Washingtonbased pro freeride mountain biker Hannah Bergemann, the only other rider to complete her line from top to bottom. “She’s good at getting in the right head space to try something scary. She can push through nerves and pressure to take on a task or challenge while at the same time lifting others up and offering a sense of encouragement.”

Though Nogueira was far from her native Argentina, Red Bull Formation’s stark desert setting was a familiar sight. In the rugged mountains of Patagonia, she fell in love with biking at the age of five. As a teenager in San Martín de los Andes, a town nestled

at the foot of the Andes mountains, Nogueira and the boys she rode bikes with would venture to new mountains, hike and explore the terrain, and find places to ride. Nogueira was often the first one to try a jump or trail. “They thought I was a little crazy,” she says. “I’ve always felt comfortable in the air and with speed, and I’ve always had confidence on my bike. If I can visualize it, I know I can do it.” (Perhaps unsurprisingly, Nogueira has broken her collarbone four times, broken her back, both wrists, and big toes, and suffered a couple of concussions.)

When Nogueira’s father first took her to watch a mountain bike race, she knew she wanted to test her skills. At 15, she started racing cross-country, then downhill—first locally, then nationally, eventually becoming a national champion and earning the title of PanAmerican downhill champion in 2016 and 2019. She moved to Europe to start her professional career in downhill racing, placing fourth in the European Downhill Cup and ranking in the top 20 for four consecutive years of UCI Mountain Bike World Cup racing.

When it was time to find a new home base in 2017, Nogueira moved to Aspen, where her boyfriend lives and works as a ski instructor. When the pandemic hit and races were cancelled,

she took to exploring the Roaring Fork Valley’s diverse trail network, including Government Trail between Snowmass and Buttermilk, Sky Mountain Park’s Deadline Trail, and the classic technical trail Sunnyside. She hones her skills at Snowmass Bike Park, where she rides a couple of days a week, and at Crown Mountain Bike Park in Basalt, where she coaches a women’s clinic and trains on the dirt jumps and pump track at least three times a week.

According to Crown Mountain Bike Park’s director, Nate Grinzinger, Nogueira’s transition from downhill racing to freeride mountain biking is unheard of. “She made history in a field that she’s only been competing in for a couple years,” Grinzinger says. “What she’s accomplished in that short amount of time is shocking. We’re all wondering what her ceiling is.”

Cami Nogueira’s Rules of the Ride

Rise at 7:30 a.m., but only after enough ZZZs.

“I love sleeping—I sleep 10 to 11 hours a night. My mornings start with a breakfast of eggs, bacon, toast, and avocado.”

Work

out regularly.

“I try to go to the gym at Snowmass Recreation Center four times a week. I follow a strength-training program from a trainer that’s similar to CrossFit, with lots of core work. I also do Iyengar yoga at a studio at my boyfriend’s sister’s house.”

Get

your lift laps in.

“If I go to the bike park, I go for the whole day. My favorite trails are Animal Crackers and Gonzo. If it’s hot, I go at sunset.”

Stay active year round.

“I got a dirt bike last summer. I ride near home and in Rifle and Grand Junction. It’s good training for mountain biking. In winter, I teach skiing.”

Fill your cup off the trails, too.

“In the evenings, I hang out with my boyfriend and his family. We love to cook—a lot of meat and vegetables on the grill—and we love to host dinner parties. When I go out, I like El Korita and Mezzaluna in Basalt. I also spend a lot of time with friends. We have a big Argentinian community in Aspen.”

The Giving Trees

A certified forest therapy guide explains forest bathing, the art and practice of slowing down.

Text by Lauren McNally

Images by John Hook, Jonah Smith, and Tamara Susa

When I arrive at our meeting place, forest bathing expert Phyllis Look invites me into her “office”—a tree-shrouded gazebo just inside the entrance of a public botanical garden. It’s here where she explains that, despite the name, forest bathing doesn’t involve any water. The term refers to the therapeutic practice of soaking in the forest atmosphere and allowing it to nourish mind, body, and soul.

The recent retiree began leading forest bathing walks after training with the Association of Nature and Forest Therapy Guides and Programs, an organization that has certified approximately 2,000 forest therapy guides in 60 countries since

Advocates of forest bathing often regard nature as both sentient and sacred.

its founding in 2012. As we amble across a sunny, sloped lawn dotted with birds burying their beaks in the grass, Look explains that she’s a guide, not a therapist or scientist. It isn’t her goal to convince anyone of the benefits of forest bathing, though decades of research into the practice show compelling findings.

Forest bathing has been around since the 1980s, an answer to the culture of toxic productivity that emerged in Japan during the country’s rapid economic growth after World War II. To address the rise in chronic disease and a phenomenon known as karoshi , or death by overwork, the Japanese government launched a public health campaign to promote shinrin-yoku, or forest bathing. Today, there are more than 60 government-supported foresttherapy bases throughout Japan. Based on the understanding that humans are wired to thrive in natural environments, forest bathing and other forms of nature therapy are gaining traction around the world as a means to cope with the stresses and mental fatigue of modern, urban life.

“I think slowness is the key,” Look says, pausing to present the first of several guided exercises in her forest walk. She refers to these exercises as “invitations.” In an invitation she calls “pleasures of presence,” I’m meant to anchor myself in the present moment through mindful engagement of the senses. “It’s as if you’re a connoisseur of grass,” she says, sipping the air through pursed lips. “Taste the oils in the grass and swirl them around in your mouth. Bring your

Though relatively new to the West, the formal practice of forest bathing has been around since the 1980s.

nose closer to the ground and inhale the secret aroma inside of that dried leaf or those pebbles of dirt. If any of these bring you pleasure, be with that pleasure. Give yourself over to it.”

Apparently, the pleasure evoked by the smell of cut grass, the cool breeze on our skin, or the soothing murmur of a distant stream isn’t just in our heads. Researchers have found that people who spend at least two hours per week in nature demonstrate a number of physiological changes, from reduced blood pressure and lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol to improvements in immune function and cognitive performance. In Japan, one of the most densely forested countries in the world, studies have centered on the effects of being around trees—namely, the disease-fighting properties of phytoncides. These airborne compounds, emitted by trees and other plants as a defense against harmful microorganisms, are also shown to activate cancer-fighting cells in humans. One study discovered the anti-cancer benefits of phytoncides last up to 30 days after a three-day immersion in nature.

You don’t need a guide to go forest bathing, Look says, but there is value in forest bathing with someone dedicated to your rest and relaxation. A guide can watch the clock, for example, so you don’t have to. “Time is very flexible,” my guide muses amid preparations for a tea ceremony, the last portion of our forest bathing session. “You can completely let go, and that’s really restful for the brain.” It’s fitting, she reasons, that the Japanese kanji for “rest” appears to be a combination of two others: the symbol for “person” and the one for “tree.”

Naturalists from the Aspen Center for Environmental

Studies share their go-to destinations for forest bathing and recreation in the Roaring Fork Valley.

Hunter Creek

The Hunter Creek area is a favorite of mine to quickly go from my humandominated life of work and family to a relaxed state of being in nature. Very quickly, the sound of the creek and the cover of the trees change my mental state. There are plenty of places to step off the trail and allow your mind to wander. Sometimes I’m drawn to something natural, like an insect or a strange spot on a leaf, and I let thoughts bounce around in my head. Sometimes I contemplate a problem and see things in a different way. New, creative ideas come up out of the blue.

Hunter Creek is generally south facing, so it stays warm during all seasons. It has diverse vegetation, from huge cottonwoods to spruce and fir. It has shrubs like oak and serviceberry, and all of the birds and animals that accompany them. There are also relics from the past—I like to look for blast marks in the rocks, where early settlers forged a path.

It’s a place I’ve been to hundreds of times, and though it is comforting in its familiarity, I uncover new insights every time I go.

—Jim Kravitz, Director of Naturalist Programs

On long summer afternoons, there’s still time to go rock climbing after work at Gold Butte, if you hurry. A friend and I once biked down Cemetery Lane already in our harnesses—she carried the rope coil tied into a backpack and I brought everything else. From the far edge of Gold Butte, we watched a storm roll in. The valley overflowed with heavy clouds from the north. We watched people

walking by the river beneath us, disappearing into mist, and yet when I gazed south, I found blue sky and Independence Pass lit by sunshine. From Gold Butte, the valley looked as wild and tucked away as the day I first saw it.

Gold Butte is covered in Gambel oak and sagebrush and sunlight. Geologically, it’s composed of Entrada sandstone, sediment deposited around an ancient interior seaway as its shoreline approached and receded. In Aspen, the exposed yellow cliffs jut out over the Roaring Fork like the prow of a ship. In Utah, the same rock forms part of Arches and Canyonlands National Parks. Being at Gold Butte makes me feel connected to the Grand Staircase of geologic units that link the Southwest.

—Grace Berg, Naturalist

North Star Nature Preserve

One of my favorite places to find quiet in the valley is North Star Nature Preserve, a section of land just east of town with trails fit for walking, running, or biking along a mellow section of the Roaring Fork. North Star Nature Preserve is easily accessible, but because of noise restrictions, it stays peaceful all year round. Whether you’re looking to paddle board on a hot day or go for a run on a brisk morning, North Star has so much space and beauty to offer.

Because it’s protected, there are so many ecological tokens you can find, especially on foot. The wildflowers that grow along the trail are diverse and gorgeous. The local moose, when given proper distance and space, are spectacular to view. The wide valley that was carved out by glaciers long ago offers a unique, open view of the surrounding mountains.

As with any place in nature, but especially in a preserve, be considerate of the flora and fauna living there. Stay on trail, check water levels if you’re paddle boarding so that you don’t disrupt the riverbed, and—my biggest tip—try to stay quiet to notice the environment around you.

—Cecily Nordstrom, Naturalist

Gold Butte

Easy Rider

As told to Lauren McNally

Images by Kevin Keller, Gabe L’Heureux, Liz Nielsen, and courtesy of IndyCar

For IndyCar racer and seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson, the mountain roads in his part-time home of Aspen are the kind that make you want to slow down and take in the view. Ahead, he describes his favorite scenic routes in and around Aspen.

The roads in Aspen are far more fun than the roads in Charlotte, much more interesting. I don’t really drive crazy on the mountain roads—thankfully I’m able to get out my need for speed on the racetrack. I find that I drive much slower in Aspen. In the summertime, you have cyclists, wildlife, people out on foot. It’s good to be cautious and learn the roads out of respect to everybody who’s out and about.

I’m always traveling in and out of Aspen for races, so I do a lot of driving by myself to and from the airport. When I have my family in the car though, one thing we love to do as soon as we’re on that final trek into town is play John Denver’s “Rocky Mountain High.” That’s our time to let it soak in that we’ve arrived in Aspen.

Independence Pass

Going up the pass is always a favorite. I like driving up to the top and exploring the area on foot. If there are parking spots, I’ll stop at the Devil’s Punchbowl and jump in the swimming hole. That’s always a great time—just be ready for cold water.

Castle Creek Road

I love the drive up Castle Creek Road. It’s one of my favorite routes. I cycle it often and have lunch at Pine Creek Cookhouse.

Elk Creek Road

One other favorite stretch is on the way to Snowmass on Elk Creek Road, when you pop up onto the plateau and drive along farmland. Such a picturesque area.

Smuggler to Four Corners

On the mountain bike, there are so many amazing trails to choose from, but I love to go up Smuggler Mountain Road and make my way up to Four Corners through Hunter Creek Valley. It’s just so beautiful around there.

Before buying a home in Aspen, Jimmie Johnson and his wife, Chandra, were frequent visitors to the valley.

Pictured above and at left, Liz Nielsen’s Ice Mountain (2021) and Ski Village (2021). The artist is represented by SOCO Gallery, owned by Chandra Johnson in Charlotte, North Carolina, where the Johnson family also spends part of the year.

Aspen’s must-have accessory.

Image by Jonah Smith

In this ode to summer in Aspen, a photographer captures the spirit of the season.

Winter in this storied ski town needs no introduction. But there’s another side of Aspen, one that reveals itself only after the mountains shed their impossibly white blankets, when the last of the snowmelt empties into the Roaring Fork River and the valley comes alive in a fury of green and gold. This is Aspen’s other high season, captured through the lens of photographer Jonah Smith. As co-founder of the lifestyle brand AETHER, which made Aspen its fourth home in 2015, Smith is no stranger to the charms of Aspen’s warmer months. Take an ambling jaunt along grassy riverbanks, sunbaked roads, and pastoral fields to discover the magic that awaits in the languid stretch from June to August.

Text by Lauren McNally

Images by Jonah Smith

More of Jonah Smith’s photographs can be found in the Aspen edition of Portraits de Villes, a project benefiting Aspen Youth Center and one in a collection of travel photography books published by the Paris- and New York City-based design studio Saint-Lazare.

Art Beyond Walls

Text by Meredith Diers

Images by Roshni Gorur, Simon Klein, Ross Kribbs, Nic Lehoux, and Rebecca Stumpf

Since its inception, the Aspen Art Museum has championed the latest in contemporary art from around the world. Discover a few of its quieter efforts to sustain an Aspen tradition of serving as a creatively nourishing place for the artists and art lovers in its own backyard.

When Chicago businessman Walter Paepcke and his wife, philanthropist Elizabeth Paepcke, arrived in Aspen in 1945 and became enamored with the area’s natural beauty, they made it their mission to redevelop the largely deserted mining camp and turn it into a destination for the bettering of mind, body, and spirit, a notion that’s come to be known as the “Aspen Idea.” Part of that vision included importing contemporary art and luring artists, thinkers, builders, and architects to the sleepy mountain town.

Over the ensuing decades, Aspen emerged as an unlikely stage for contemporary art, drawing a steady stream of art-world figures who brought with them the latest in Pop Art, Minimalism, and the Bauhaus. Each new import helped to fuel a succession of arts institutions such as the Aspen Center of Contemporary Art, established in 1979 and renamed the Aspen Art Museum (AAM) in 1984.

When the museum eventually moved from its original home in a repurposed hydroelectric plant on the outskirts of downtown Aspen to its current location on a prominent corner in the center of town in 2014, it was a polarizing presence. The new building, designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Shigeru Ban, resembled nothing else in the area; its inaugural rooftop exhibition, Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang’s Moving Ghost Town, was equally controversial.

Yet the institution continued to serve as an anchor in the local art scene, recently serving as the sole venue in the country to host a major retrospective of the life and work of Pop Art icon and frequent Aspen visitor Andy Warhol.

Significant not only for seizing the spotlight from art cities such as New York and London, the museum-wide survey exhibition also highlighted Aspen’s history of attracting influential figures in popular culture and enchanting them with its holistic mix of culture, nature, and recreation.

On the heels of such a high-profile international exhibition as Andy Warhol: Lifetimes, it’s easy to forget all the ways the Aspen Art Museum has quietly worked alongside Aspen’s numerous institutions and community arts centers to enrich the artists and community in its own backyard. That effort, however, is a cornerstone of the museum, says Executive Director Nicola Lees, who took the helm of AAM at a defining moment—the onset of the pandemic in 2020—and who “sees the museum as a community resource first.”

To that end, the Aspen Art Museum has steadily facilitated arts and cultural programming throughout the Roaring Fork Valley, including bringing art to an unexpected place: Pitkin County Jail. For more than a decade, AAM has been sending arts educators to the detention facility along with images of the art currently on display in the museum, using the works as inspiration for corresponding exercises in art making. Lessons have included line drawing, paper folding, and sculpture, with the goal of creating an active, multisensory experience unlike those typically available to the incarcerated.

“Many don’t understand how art can be a meaningful part of life,” says artist, educator, and AAM Director of Education and Community Programs Teresa Booth Brown. “As an art teacher of 40 years, bringing this experience

Artist Precious Okoyomon is pictured at Anderson Ranch Arts Center creating work for a major solo exhibition at Aspen Art Museum.

to the inmates, one that most have not had, is incredible to see.”

Temporarily on hold due to the pandemic, the program ran once a week since its inception. When sessions are allowed to resume, Booth Brown plans to expand the program to include new mediums, starting with clay—part of a new partnership with Carbondale Clay Center, a nonprofit community arts center located a half hour from Aspen in Carbondale.

In a separate partnership with another Carbondale institution, Anderson Ranch Arts Center, the Aspen Art Museum presented its longest-running exhibition to date: Every Earthly Morning the Sky’s Light touches Ur Life is Unprecedented in its Beauty. For the opening of the installation in the summer of 2021, New York City-based Nigerian American artist and poet Precious Okoyomon transformed the rooftop of the Aspen Art Museum into a verdant garden populated by a chaotic assemblage of invasive and indigenous plants. On view for 18 months through October 2022, the ambitious display is designed to evolve with the passing seasons and features sculptures and ceramic tiles that Okoyomon crafted at Anderson Ranch Arts Center over two visits in Spring 2021.

Anderson Ranch Arts Center was also the hosting venue for a recent gallery show featuring the Aspen Art Museum’s 2021 artist fellows, a culmination of the museum’s nine-month-long artist fellowship program, which Booth Brown founded in 2018. Open to artists living and working in the Roaring Fork Valley, the program offers mentorship, professional development, and

opportunities to meet with other artist fellows, visiting artists, and curators, as well as an honorarium to realize each artist’s fellowship project.

During her time as an AAM artist fellow, artist Lara Whitley created an ephemeral work for Aspen Space Station, an immersive outdoor art exhibition erected by a group of artists and climate activists on a 30-acre site on the back of Aspen Mountain in the summer of 2021. Whitley contributed a shrine-like space crafted from “mountain glass,” a term she uses to describe the century-old glass, ironstone pottery, and other relics from Aspen’s mining era that she recovers from former dumping grounds near her home studio in Aspen.

Whitley also spent the fellowship developing a large-scale public installation she’s preparing to construct later this year at Beyul Retreat, a sprawling wilderness refuge located an hour outside of Aspen in the White River National Forest. The installation will serve as another contemplative space in nature, this time delineated by walls of aquamarine glass fragments suspended between a thicket of lodgepole pine trees that stand in a naturally occurring spiral along the 10th Mountain Division Trail.

“Aspen and the Roaring Fork Valley is a tough place to be an artist because of the cost of living, but it’s also a great place to be an artist because of the fantastic resources and support here,” Whitley says. “The cohort of artists provided resources and a community, and the fellowship allowed me the freedom to be more daring with my ideas. It was permission to go big for a year.”

Upscale not Up in Smoke, Aspen’s high-end dispensaries are a far cry from the head shops of yesteryear.

Aspen has long held a reputation as a bastion of the luxury lifestyle, so it’s no surprise that the local cannabis scene is equally as elevated. Since recreational marijuana sales legally began in Colorado in 2014, Aspen has also amassed the state’s highest density of dispensaries per capita; there are eight stores in the downtown core alone, with two others in Snowmass Village.

But there is one dispensary that set an industry-wide precedent for what cannabis culture could look like in the post-legalization era. First opening its doors as a medical-only retailer in 2009, Silverpeak Apothecary went on to carve a niche in the adult-use marijuana market, undergoing a swift post-legalization redesign with an ambience more akin to a Saks Fifth Avenue than a smoke shop. At no other dispensary, even in Aspen, could you find elegantly backlit display cases custom built from natural hardwoods or your purchases presented on a silver platter.

Text by Katie Shapiro

Images by Sean Berrigan and courtesy of Coda Signature, Dalwhinnie Farms, and Nomatiq

Silverpeak also set itself apart early on for its dedication to growing the cleanest product on the market. At High Valley Farms, a state-of-theart grow operation the company opened downvalley in Basalt in 2014, Silverpeak pioneered industry-leading practices that made it among the most technologically advanced grow facilities in the state. Today Silverpeak continues to produce pesticide-free flower for its Aspen retail location and dispensary partners, including sister brand, The Dab, which operates six locations in Colorado.

In both product and customer experience, Silverpeak was in a class of its own until Dalwhinnie Farms debuted its first brick-and-mortar boutique in 2021. Dalwhinnie’s upscale, ground-level storefront on Mill Street is a departure from its mostly basementdwelling competitors, and, like Silverpeak, it promises only the highest quality products, enforcing strict sustainability and organic cultivation practices at its 30,000-square-foot greenhouse located three hours south of Aspen in rural Ridgway.

The family-owned company converted a former dressage riding arena on a 230acre equestrian ranch into a full-scale cannabis farm, drawing inspiration from the farm’s ranching origins for the Western-themed aesthetic of its storefront in Aspen. “The regions where we set up both our cultivation and store—the scenery is just breathtaking,”

says Dalwhinnie Farms CEO Brandon Barksdale. “We really wanted to capture the essence of the Colorado spirit and have it come to life, which has really resonated here.”

Today, Aspen remains the epicenter of luxury cannabis thanks to Dalwhinnie Farms and Silverpeak, both of which have established a benchmark for similarly refined retail concepts springing up in major legal metropolises such as Los Angeles, Chicago, and Boston. And with an increasingly sophisticated clientele emerging in the years since legalization in Colorado, the state has birthed brands eager to cater to their discerning tastes. Both Dalwhinnie and Silverpeak stock an array of artisan edibles and ingestibles from local companies like Binske, 1906, Ripple by Stillwater Brands, and Coda Signature.

“We have had such a deep relationship with Aspen’s many impressive dispensaries ever since our very early days,” says Lauren Gockley, Coda Signature’s co-founder and vice president of innovation, who trained at l’École du Grand Chocolat in France and spent time working alongside master chefs Jean-Georges Vongerichten and Thomas Keller. “I like to imagine that our customers share many of the same passions as the Aspen community: beauty, culinary arts, music, adventure, and, of course, cannabis. Aspen is to Colorado what Coda is to cannabis.”

Legalization has also sparked a wave of design-forward smoking accoutrements from startups and established brands alike. Alongside Dalwhinnie Farms’ branded cashmere blankets, candles, apparel, and custom leather goods, you can shop diamond-encrusted fine jewelry and vintage Rolexes with marijuana leaf designs by Jacquie Aiche (Rihanna is a client and past collaborator), sleek vegan leather Rogue Paq cannabis carrying cases, and handmade pipes and bongs from niche brands Summerland and Stonedware.

For Edie Parker founder and creative director Brett Heyman, who has gained a cult following for her candy-colored acrylic clutches, launching a premium line of playful smoking accessories was a natural next step for her beloved brand. “My goal was to combine my love for fashion and cannabis to introduce products that were meant to be displayed and that catered to a female audience, since there weren’t many [cannabis] brands authentically speaking to that group,” Heyman says of Flower by Edie Parker. “It has been fantastic to see other brands begin to do the same. The fight for destigmatization is one of the most important issues in the industry. The sooner we can get people to see cannabis as something that does not need to be hidden or shame inducing, the better.”

First Growth, New Growth

One of Napa’s most venerable producers of Cabernet Sauvignon passes the torch to the next generation.

Text by Carey Jones

Images by Jordan Curet, Emily Mae, and Boris Zharkov

“This region has some of the best potential on the planet,” says Will Harlan, managing director of his family’s renowned wineries in Napa Valley.

“It’s hard to see just how special this is when you’re growing up,” says Will Harlan, 34, of his family’s world-class wineries in Oakville, California. And “special,” here, is an understatement. Harlan Estate, which his father Bill Harlan founded in 1984, produces one of Napa Valley’s true cult cabernets: a Bordeaux-style wine retailing for an average of $1,500 per bottle, with a two-year wait to get on the allocation list; winning accolades too numerous to name; and earning praise from the likes of wine critic Robert Parker, who once called Harlan Estate “the single most profound red wine made not just in California, but in the world.”

Taking up the mantle of this esteemed family of wines—which includes the labels BOND, Promontory, and The Mascot, in addition to Harlan Estate—is a daunting proposition. But Will Harlan, recently named managing director, and his 32-yearold sister, Amanda Harlan, are up for the task. While Bill remains active within the business (and “still works 18-hour days,” Amanda confirms), it’s his children who will usher the wineries into their next phase alongside winemaker Cory Empting, who assumed the role of managing director of winegrowing in January 2021 from his longtime mentor Bob Levy.

Bill Harlan often speaks of his “200-year plan” for Harlan Estate, aiming to build wineries that, like the great estates of Europe, will endure over the centuries. Now, 40 years in, a new generation is stepping up to shape the decades ahead.

On Cory Empting’s first day as a 20-year-old summer intern at Harlan Estate, his truck was unable to climb the unpaved driveway, spurring him to get out and walk. He’s felt a profound connection to the land ever since. “It’s truly grounding; there’s a Zen quality to it,” says Empting, who has been with Harlan Estate for more than two decades. “This property hooked me in and became like home.”

There’s a sense of poetry in how Empting describes the land and the wines produced from its singular terroir. Describing Harlan Estate’s intaglio-printed label, which depicts a female figure harvesting grapes, he says, “There’s a certain confidence in her presence, one foot firmly planted on the ground. But when you look at the garments, there’s a real softness, with intricate detail. That balance is really the identity of Harlan Estate.”

Promontory, on the other hand, he compares to a cathedral. “There’s so much stone, so much mass. It’s very structural,” Empting says. “But your focus isn’t on the weight of the structur e—it’s the space, the coolness of the stone, the light that’s coming through.” The structure itself, in other words, allows someth ing ethereal to emerge.

According to Will Harlan, the essence of his father’s “200-year plan” is continuity. In a way, Empting’s role is thus one of stewardship more than innovation. However, he’s come to realize that there’s always room to explore and evolve. In his earlier years with the company, Empting thought “we were 95 percent of the way there, and then we’d spend generations refining that last 5 percent. But now, I think I had that reversed.”

“There’s artistry in what they do, and we respect them not just as workers, but as thinkers,” says Managing Director of Winegrowing Cory Empting, above, in reference to Promontory’s highly specialized vineyard workers.

The Storyteller

Amanda Harlan didn’t necessarily intend to join the family business, but, she says, “It always had a gravitational pull.” Today, she formally serves as the director of communications for Meadowood Napa Valley, which the family co-owns, and private club The Napa Valley Reserve. But more broadly, she sees her role as sharing her family’s wines with the world.

“We’ve built four wineries and many different projects under my father’s incredible vision,” she says. “And now we have an opportunity to continue with our patrons, and welcome in new patrons to be on a lifelong journey with us.”

At an intimate dinner at the recently renovated ASPENX Mountain Club at the top of Aspen Mountain in early 2022, she served six vintages of Harlan Estate wine pulled from the family’s own library. “It was a serious, almost spiritual moment to see how our stable of vintages are evolving,” Amanda recalls.

Seizing another opportunity to share a taste of Napa Valley outside the region, Amanda also hosted a dinner at

Element 47—a wine lovers’ destination at The Little Nell—in celebration of the tenth anniversary of The Mascot. At $150 a bottle, The Mascot is the most accessible of the Harlan family’s wines, Amanda says, attracting both “young folks who are just beginning their journey, and more established wine drinkers trying something approachable and exciting within our domain umbrella.”

The Mascot is a version of the house wine that the Harlans drank around the dinner table, Amanda reveals. “It’s something we’ve shared informally since the beginning,” she says. “Before it even had a label, we’d just write a note in gold Sharpie right on the bottle for our friends.”

Year after year, The Mascot continues to be a herald of things to come. “Since it comes from the younger vines, you can see the potential of what will happen with those vines down the road,” Amanda says. “It’s like a glimpse behind the curtain.”

Moments from a Harlan Estate wine dinner hosted by Amanda Harlan at The Little Nell’s ASPENX Mountain Club in February 2022.

The Successor

Like his sister, Will Harlan felt the gravitational pull of the family business. Returning to Northern California after college to work in tech, Will found that the proximity of the vineyards kept drawing him back. Dabbling in winemaking led to his first project, The Mascot, the experimental cabernet made from the younger vines of the family’s estates. Concurrently, the family was working on its next venture: acquiring an 840-acre piece of land that would become home to Promontory winery, located just a few hundred yards away from Harlan Estate.

The family had been interested in the Promontory parcel for decades. “It’s hidden, it’s rugged, it’s wild—we felt intuitively that this place would have a lot of potential,” says Will, who worked his way up at Promontory and was appointed its managing director in 2015. “But we purchased the property without a clear idea of what we were going to do with it.”

That gave them the freedom to approach the land and its winemaking potential with an open mind. “Promontory was an opportunity to chart a new course,” Will says. “To create a foundation for something that could, one day, become one of the great wines.” Having watched his father build Harlan Estate and BOND from nothing, he savored the opportunity to be part of bringing a vision to fruition himself.

With the aid of Stanford geologists, the Harlan family discovered that Promontory was inherently poised to assume an identity all its own. “Napa

Valley is a geologically dynamic place,” Will explains. “Broadly speaking, it’s divided into volcanic and sedimentary soils. But we found a small fault that runs through the property that pushed up an island of metamorphic rock. It’s the only representation of this metamorphic material in the region.”

That soil ties directly to the identity of the wine; the same grape, grown just hundreds of yards away, takes on a completely different character. “The tannins are so fine, it feels almost weightless,” Will says. “For a cabernet to achieve that? It’s almost otherworldly.”

Unlike Harlan’s other brands, Promontory hosts private tastings and visits on the property, allowing guests to see the dramatic landscape for themselves and learn how it translates to the wine. “At the end of the day, the wine we produce here is not inexpensive,” Will says. “But if we create an environment where people can really understand what’s going into the wine, then the wine itself becomes less daunting.”

As winemakers, the family ’s primary focus will always be the vineyards and translating the character of the land to the wines. Still, Will sees connecting with clientele as essential to the operation and to the next chapter of the wineries “There’s a lot of demand for our wine,” he says. “Going forward, we want to really know the people drinking it.” There’s history and craftsmanship in every bottle, but only when it’s uncorked and enjoyed does the other side of the story begin.

A charming detail at Mawa’s Kitchen.

Image by Anna Stonehouse

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Chef-restaurateur Mawa McQueen dishes on the healthy, no-frills fare at her beloved Aspen eateries.

You know what’s funny? I never intended to open a restaurant. My first job in Aspen was at The Little Nell as a breakfast server, then supervisor and manager. After ten years of waking up at 5 a.m., I was known as the Breakfast Queen. Morning shifts are tough because you never know how people feel: They’re upset because they didn’t get laid last night or the coffee’s not hot enough. Either way, they blame you. Keep smiling!

Still, I always loved breakfast at The Nell because it’s consistently good. And you know that the service will be on point. Oh, those lemon soufflé pancakes! Even after I left in 2012, I remained “Mawa from The Little Nell.”

In 2006, while still with The Nell, I opened my own private chef business, Mawa’s Kitchen, in the Aspen Airport Business Center (AABC). We started catering for private jet owners early on. I make whatever they want. I began focusing on gluten-free cuisine and baked goods since eating bread made me feel heavy. Nobody knew about gluten sensitivity back then.

Mawa McQueen was named a semifinalist in the 2022 James Beard Awards for Best Chef: Mountain Region.

Mawa’s Kitchen was a tiny commercial space to support my catering, cooking classes, private parties, and kids’ camp. You walked in the door through the kitchen by a big freezer. Everyone thought that was cute, but it wasn’t on purpose.

Clients asked me constantly to open a restaurant. So I did, reluctantly, starting with lunch. The first five years of owning the restaurant were a struggle. I resisted launching dinner, but we [my husband and business partner, Daniel] weren’t making money. It was hard to attract people to the ABC, three miles from downtown. Now, 14 years later, more folks live downvalley and commute right by here every day.

Eventually, people started coming to the ABC to experience Mawa’s Kitchen. We make everything organic, fresh, and farm-to-table, using produce from Farm Runners in Paonia and Two Roots Farm in Basalt. I was the only Aspen chef who served eggs Benedict with salad. It’s so rich already, do you really need potatoes?

My style is French-Mediterranean with African flair. Originally it was classic American; now I’m comfortable sharing

my culture. My mother, Jeanne Kouao, is Christian, from the Akan tribe in the Ivory Coast. My father, Sékou Sidibe, is Muslim, from the Malinke tribe in Mali and Guinea. Mawa is a Muslim name meaning “lovely.” I was born in the Ivory Coast and raised in Paris—a true melting pot heritage.

This summer we’re serving more African dishes: maafe, our style of curry using organic peanut butter; yassa , mustard-marinated chicken grilled and stewed with caramelized onions and vegetables, served over rice; braised oxtail with collard greens; and jollof rice. Every country has its own fried rice! For years I’ve used fonio, Africa’s oldest cultivated grain, in our bestselling gluten-free pancakes.

During the coronavirus pandemic, we were finally able to expand. Our neighbor, designer Barbara Glass, helped to remodel the dining room, pro bono. She captured my essence. Now everyone wants to take Instagram photos in front of our signature wallpaper.

GrainFreeNola was my Covid baby. Our company produces gluten-free,

vegan, kosher, paleo, and grain-free granola, made with nuts and seeds and sweetened by dates, fruit, and berries. Each flavor tells a story about me. It’s very spiritual to mix the granola by hand. I want people to feel my energy when they eat it.

I never planned to open another restaurant, but we did, in Snowmass Base Village. The Crêpe Shack is an ode to my French side. The crêpe is the new taco, and it’s versatile—it can be savory or sweet. Soon I’m opening The Crêpe Shack in Aspen and at Denver’s Union Station.

Last year during the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen, I walk into the tasting tents and chefs Marcus Samuelsson and Andrew Zimmern are signing books. Suddenly these women scream, “Oh my god, it’s Mawa!” Marcus and Andrew look up, like, “Who is she?” That’s right, guys, I’m the celebrity here. Welcome to my town.

Fast forward to February: It’s a full-circle moment to be named a 2022 James Beard Award semifinalist alongside The Little Nell for Outstanding Wine Program. I cried so hard! We complete each other. We always have.

The owner of high-end consignment shop The Little Bird reflects on 15 years of dressing the stylish women of Aspen.

When I was growing up in Kansas, both of my grandmothers taught me an appreciation for clothing. Both were incredible seamstresses. One made her own outfits from Vogue Patterns, which were impeccable, and the other worked at a high-end boutique. I have so much appreciation for the quality and beauty of fine clothing.

I moved to Aspen in the summer of 1998. My college roommates were living in Woody Creek, and they asked if I wanted to come for the summer. I worked at two boutiques in Snowmass Village and realized I had a knack for buying, and I loved organizing and displaying merchandise.

As told to Barbara Platts

Images by Megan Wynn

Upon moving to Aspen, Keele Loyd “worked all the jobs— waitressing, retail, nannying, anything to make ends meet.”

From 2000 to 2002, I worked at P.E. 101 in Aspen. After that, I managed two other high-end boutiques downtown. We would send merchandise from previous seasons to a consignment shop in California. I was also selling some personal items on eBay, the best method for selling used clothing at the time. I knew I wanted my own retail store but didn’t have the capital to fund a traditional women’s boutique, and the idea for a consignment store hit me like a lightning strike. The following week, I wrote the business plan for The Little Bird on an airplane ticket on my way to New York for a buying trip. The Little Bird began modestly, with an investment from a friend and small savings.

About eight months after opening my Aspen store in 2007, I was diagnosed with cancer. I went to MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston for treatment. I was in Houston for a good chunk of 2008 and decided to open a second store there in August 2011. A year later my son, Emmett, was born. Raising him on my own, we spent years driving back and forth between Texas and Colorado, moving 11 times in four years

to keep my business afloat. I opened a third location in Willits Town Center in Basalt last year.

Styles have definitely changed over the years I ’ ve been in business. That’s the nature of fashion—everything cycles through, and you have to be really aware of what people are wearing. Items that sold well in the early days of the store, like high-end fur by Dennis Basso or J. Mendel, don’t perform as well anymore. I tried selling vintage in the beginning, and there wasn’t much of a demand. Now, vintage is really popular. I think because the luxury market is so flooded, people really like the unique pieces. Brands like Escada, Missoni, and Etro were hard for me to sell, and now they are the first ones going out the door. Because our consigners shop all over the world, we get a lot of items that are one of a kind. I also frequent estate sales, where you can find clothing from decades ago.

People don’t dress up as much as they used to in Aspen. When I first moved here, people wanted to be very showy. I think the day-to-day look is

a lot more casual now. We sell a lot of denim, from Mother and Frame to R13 and dSquared2. Ladies will take denim and pair it with a big, chunky sweater—maybe a Valentina sweater— and cute boots in the winter, a fedora or a cowboy hat, and a handbag. The handbag and the shoes are the biggest statement pieces in an outfit. They’re also our bestselling items in the store. For events, we sell a lot of Alaïa dresses. That’s probably our top dress brand. As for skiwear, we sell the fashion brands that are still really functional, like Frauenschuh, Prada, and Bogner.

We work with ladies aged 18 to 80. I’ve watched little girls grow into young women, witnessed young women become new wives and mothers, seen women grieve the loss of loved ones. We’re not here to do a hard sell, which is why I think we have long-term relationships with our customers.

Looking back on the last 15 years, I’m really thankful and proud I’ve made it this far while raising my son as a single parent. I started all of this from scratch, moved here with nothing, and became a pioneer in this industry. I’m also proud of the team of women I’ve worked with. I wanted to create a place women enjoy coming to, both staff and clientele. I like to think that’s shown all of these years.

Living History

with Sarah Broughton and John Rowland

The husband-and-wife duo behind Rowland+Broughton discuss the origins of their design firm and their passion for historic preservation.

As told to Linda Hayes

Images by Kelsey Brunner and courtesy of Rowland+Broughton

John Rowland: Sarah and I met in 1993 during our first design studio course at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Environmental Design school. She had long hippie hair and wore overalls with Birkenstocks. The second semester, we’d each present projects we’d been working on. I’ll never forget standing in front of my class every Friday and nobody had questions about my design except Sarah. Why did I choose that color? She drove me crazy! After 12 hours a week together, we got to know each other and became class buddies. The end of that semester, we became romantic.

The Aspen Institute’s Boettcher Building, designed by legendary Bauhaus architect Herbert Bayer and recently restored by Rowland+Broughton.

Sarah Broughton: John was thoughtful and adventurous. We shared a passion. We pushed and influenced each other on both professional and personal levels. After graduation, we got married and moved to New York to work, then to Australia, where we worked for competing firms. But in addition to being ambitious about our careers, we really wanted to be in a community that had a lot of cultural offerings as well as the great outdoors, so we moved to Aspen in 2000.

JR: During those early days of getting our practice going, we worked out of our 600-square-foot condo. Our conference table—a butcher-block mounted on file cabinets—was also our dining table. We worked there 16 hours a day.

SB: I’ll never forget, we had a client at that time who said, “We’re going to remember when we sat at this table and had meetings in your kitchen!” It was challenging, but we built up our street cred within the community and within our professional network. Along the way, we came to realize how important it is to sustain the legacy of historic buildings. It spurred our passion for historic preservation and became a foundation of our firm, Rowland+Broughton, which we founded in 2003.

JR: Preserving the heritage and legacy of this special town and its evolution over time is paramount to telling the story of the West.

SB: There’s so much energy in historical buildings. We believe that one of the most sustainable things to do is preserve them and look to them for lessons on how to build to last. Creating a living heritage within our built environment is so important.

JR: It’s a concept that we’ve embraced in all of our work, whether it’s residential or commercial, architecture or interior design, and in our personal lives. When we built our home in the West End in 2015, we picked up the historic 1890s house that was there on a double-wide lot and placed it on a new foundation, which created a vacant lot to build on. We got approval from the Historic Preservation Commission to design a house that retained the historic home’s traditional detailing—like the gable form and traditional clapboard siding—but was also modern in its own way. We were able to achieve LEED gold certification for energy efficiency.

SB: We’ve chosen to keep our nuclear family small, so having friends and family over is a huge part of our life. We designed the doors to pocket back into the walls, allowing the living room to dissolve into the backyard and bocce ball court beyond. There’s plenty of wall space so that we can live among art. We love to cook, so the open kitchen is really great. There’s a banquette for dinner parties and an office so we can work at home. It feels very much like us.

JR: Our commitment to preservation also applies to our studio at the top of Main Street, which we opened in 2019. When we first came to town, we were in awe of the historic building— its stature, its traditional storefront. We studied how it looked over time and restored it with a commitment to preservation and also to creating a flexible, collaborative interior for our team. We went through a similar process for our Denver studio, which is located in a historic building in the city’s LoDo neighborhood, and recently for our rehabilitation of the Aspen Institute’s historic Boettcher Building, originally designed by Herbert Bayer.

SB: After 22 years here, we feel so fortunate to be a part of this community and to engage with the landscape, the town, and the creativity here, and with people who are aligned with our passion—especially our clients, who mentor us as much as we mentor them. We’re optimistic about where we are and where we’re going. It’s getting better all the time.

Wining and unwinding at Element 47.

Image by Ehrad Tairovci

The ASPENX concept store, located in Aspen’s Gondola Plaza, is a gateway to bespoke skiwear, rental equipment, and elevated food and wine experiences both on and off mountain.

For its 75th anniversary, Aspen Skiing Company debuts an innovative new concept led by owner, multimedia artist, and Aspen luminary Paula Crown.

In a vibrant town like Aspen, there’s always something new happening. But for Aspen Skiing Company’s 75th anniversary this year, owner Paula Crown recognized the milestone as an invitation to look beyond the horizon to what’s next.

In December 2021, Aspen Skiing Company launched the retail and experiential brand ASPENX. Conceptualized and spearheaded by Crown herself, ASPENX offers a menu of ski performance wear, unique collaborations, and custom experiences inspired by the technical excellence and thought leadership that Aspen is known for.

The brand launched with a signature skiwear line, Ajax, and quickly followed with the drop of a collaboration that had fashionistas and ski aficionados taking notice: ASPENX Prada. The first ASPENX Prada capsule collection included a six-piece range of performance outerwear featuring Prada Linea Rossa’s Extreme-Tex waterproof layer, Graphene padding to regulate body temperature, and distinctive graphic black-and-white designs by Paula Crown, inspired by Aspen’s vibrant energy and rhythmic atmosphere.

It was a partnership years in the making. In reviewing past uniform designs for Aspen Skiing Company, Crown came across a decades-old Prada proposal that her company had not proceeded with due to production limitations. The material detailed in the proposal promised to be lighter and softer than traditional waterproof fabrics, and Crown wanted to learn more.

“In addition to Prada’s exceptional design and reuse of sustainable nylon, I was aware they had designed competitive gear for the World Cup sailing team,” Crown says. “I expect that those sailors, like our pros, have the highest performance standards, and that Prada delivered.”

X Marks the Spot

Images by Daniel Bayer and John Russo

Craig Robins of Miami’s Design District introduced her to Lorenzo Bertelli, who spearheads Prada’s marketing, digital strategy, and sustainability efforts. Across thousands of miles, multiple languages, and a global pandemic, the two hatched the idea of a co-branded skiwear product. “I believe in imagination as a force to connect ideas and people,” Crown says. “Lorenzo and I aligned on many goals and agreed to proceed.”

In development discussions, the team in Aspen led with its legacy brand and “sport” orientation, while the Prada team brought exceptional design and “body” sensibility. In Spring 2021, Prada sent skiwear prototypes to Aspen for field testing. “Our pros  stress–tested them and we relayed detailed feedback to Italy. The iterative creative process of design mirrored my studio art practice,” Crown says. “It was a privilege to observe so many talented players in the mix.”

The ASPENX Prada collaboration continues into Spring/Summer 2022 with an even deeper focus on sustainability, featuring accessories and apparel made from Prada’s signature Re-Nylon, a regenerated nylon yarn (ECONYL®) produced from discarded fishing nets, textile waste fibers, and recycled, purified plastic trash collected from the ocean.

To learn more about ASPENX Prada, visit aspenx.com or visit the flagship store location in Aspen’s Gondola Plaza.

Like all of the menu items at Ajax Tavern, the cauliflower gratin is a fresh take on traditional tavern fare.

Rivaling Ajax Tavern’s famous truffle fries, this vegan appetizer has quickly become a favorite among guests. Take a piece of Aspen home with you by recreating this mouthwatering dish.

Ajax Tavern’s Cauliflower Gratin

Ingredients:

4 ounces (approximately 1 cup) raw cashews

2 cups cauliflower florets

2 teaspoons nutritional yeast

2 teaspoons tamari

2 teaspoons Dijon mustard

3 cloves garlic

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Salt to taste

Directions:

1. Bring approximately 2 cups of water to a boil, then pour over cashews and soak for 1 hour.

2. Purée cashews until smooth. Add more water while puréeing as needed.

3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

4. Roast the cauliflower in the oven for 17 to 20 minutes or until the cauliflower is tender and its edges are crispy.

5. Purée all other ingredients with the puréed cashews to make cashew cheese.

6. While hot, toss cauliflower with cashew cheese and serve.

Ajax at Home

Image by Chris Council and Emily Chaplin of C2 Photography

Chris Dunaway, wine director at The Little Nell, traces his fascination with wine back to summer nights spent wandering his grandfather’s grapevines in Kentucky.

Wine director Chris Dunaway shares a few of his favorite pours for the summer season.

When Chris Dunaway was promoted from head sommelier to wine director of The Little Nell in the spring of 2019, he shared several of his goals in an exclusive interview with Wine Spectator, noting, “I have always dreamed of being a wine director and having that kind of influence on other sommeliers and others in the industry and helping to grow and promote something great.”

Since taking the reins, Dunaway has held true to these objectives, expanding the wine list to more than 3,000 selections and, in doing so, diversifying the wine cellar both by geographic region and production method, incorporating a mix of organic, natural, and biodiverse wines. During his tenure, The Wine Bar emerged as a new outlet at the hotel, along with a speakeasy known as The Board Room.

Here are some of his top picks for summertime.

Après Vin de Savoie Rosé

“There’s no better match for long summer afternoons on the patio at Ajax Tavern than a beautifully crafted and crisp rosé. While many are keenly aware of the high quality of rosé hailing from the French Riviera in Provence, there are many hidden gems to be discovered elsewhere in the French countryside, like this one produced in the hills of Savoie. This rosé is a blend of Mondeuse and Gamay, which are bright and spicy varietals planted up high in the French Alps. Truly an Alpine wine to be enjoyed during your visits to Aspen or back at home.”

Domaine Génot-Boulanger Clos du Cromin Meursault

“A beautifully crafted bottle of White Burgundy is satisfying year round, and one of my favorites, without question, is Meursault. It has a power and richness that is complemented by an electric, lip-smacking freshness and zestiness that culminates in waves of minerality and a never-ending finish. This wine is best enjoyed on a warm afternoon in Aspen, lingering on the Element 47 patio, or lounging by the pool, surrounded by our lush gardens and mountain views.”

Heitz Cellar Martha’s Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

This is truly one of the most iconic wines, and certainly one that was instrumental in first putting Napa Valley on the map. Martha’s Vineyard is the first single vineyard-designated wine in the history of Napa Valley, a style suggesting an inimitable signature tied to the place where it’s produced. We love it not only for its sustained excellence and consistency, but also for its tie to The Little Nell—former wine director Carlton McCoy MS and former head sommelier Erik Elliot AS are the managing partner and estate director, respectively, representing Heitz Cellar. I recommend sipping this gem while experiencing a tasting in The Little Nell’s Wine Cellar, the very space these two legendary alums helped curate not long ago at The Little Nell.”

Salud to Summer

Image by Jamie Jaye Fletcher

At The Little Nell, there’s an an off-road tour to suit any type of adventurer.

With The Little Nell’s array of summer excursions, you choose your own adventure.

With its bright blue skies, crisp mountain air, blooming wildflowers, and splendid scenery, summer in Aspen is truly magical. One of the best ways to experience Aspen’s natural beauty is with an off-road tour through Adventures with The Little Nell. Trips often follow Aspen Mountain Summer Road, which crests Richmond Ridge and Aspen Mountain’s 11,212foot summit. Here you’ll look down on the glittering city of Aspen, across the Maroon Bells wilderness, and out to the Continental Divide.

Depending on the tour, you may also traverse butterflydotted ridge lines, amble along the shores of crystal-clear lakes, or journey through the middle of a forgotten ghost town. And to top it all off, you’ll enjoy culinary offerings from our chefs, paired with curated selections from our award-winning wine list. Browse our assortment of offroad tours or contact our adventure concierge to create a customized experience.

Morning Mountain Outing

Take a ride on the wild side in the comfort of our custom off-road vehicle operated by an experienced adventure guide. Enjoy the rugged beauty of the Elk Mountains as you meander through the mountains and take in the scenery filled with wildflowers and wildlife, then enjoy a picnic packed with pastries, juice, and coffee.

Sunset Off-Road Adventure

Our most popular summer outing in Aspen, this spectacular off-road tour takes you from downtown to the top of Aspen Mountain to soak up stunning 360-degree views of the Elk Mountain range. This is the premier spot for sunsets, complemented by a bottle of Champagne and a charcuterie board. This experience can be customized with additional food and beverage enhancements, such as sashimi, caviar, and elevated wine selections.

Off the Road

Images by Oliver Sutro

Mountaintop Photoshoot

Capture a picture-perfect moment in the mountains with this unique offroad adventure. Our adventure guide will take you to the most picturesque areas of the mountain, where a professional photographer will capture your portraits and provide you with a photo gallery afterward so you can relive the experience. Drinks and snacks will be provided.

Mountain Vista Wine Tasting

The Little Nell has long been recognized for our award-winning wine program, exclusive access, and exhilarating off-road adventures. This experience combines all three, with a sommelier-led wine tasting and an off-road tour to a special Aspen destination. Prior to your outing, a sommelier from our team will consult with you to determine your preferred wine and food selections. Your adventure by off-road vehicle sets off from town, ascending halfway up Aspen Mountain to reach the hideaway of Buckhorn Cabin. Upon arrival, you’ll be greeted with a glass of Dom Pérignon P2 from the Second Plentitude series. The wine tasting continues with a selection of samplings pulled from our 20,000-bottle wine cellar, accompanied by gourmet bites.

To book an off-road tour, contact adventure@thelittlenell.com or call 970.920.6315.