Kate Payne Brown is the winemaker at Argyle in Willamette Valley, Oregon. Throughout her storied two-decade career, Kate Payne Brown has earned recognition as a sparkling wine specialist and one of Oregon’s most gifted winemakers. Named Argyle’s Head Winemaker in 2025, Kate is the third winemaker in the winery’s history. She oversees both the sparkling and still wine programs.
Kate honed her craft at Archery Summit, then refined her sensibility working in Burgundy and Champagne, with renowned consultant Kyriakos Kynigopoulos. Returning to Oregon, she founded Dolores Wines, then joined Stoller Family Estate, where she built the in-house sparkling program from the ground up and was later named Reserve Winemaker. Before joining Argyle, she also made critically acclaimed wines for Ambar Estate and was winemaker and partner at Vinovate Wine Services, the Willamette Valley’s premier custom crush facility.
Raised in Utah, Kate holds a B.S. from the University of Oregon and a Master’s in Oenology from the University of Adelaide in Australia.
Media Inquiries: Jane Brigham jane@lawrence-pr.com | https://argylewinery.com/
What’s the ONE THING most unique, authentic, & memorable about your brand?
What makes Argyle most unique is that it was built on a belief in the future, long before that belief was obvious to anyone else. In 1987, when Oregon was focused on still wines, Rollin Soles and Brian Croser made a very different decision. They saw something in this place, the light, the long growing season, the natural acidity, and believed it was perfectly suited for Traditional Method sparkling wine. That required patience, conviction, and a willingness to invest in wines that wouldn’t be realized for years. That spirit still defines us.
As only the third winemaker in nearly 40 years, I feel a deep responsibility to carry that vision forward, not by replicating it, but by continuing to believe in what Oregon can become. Traditional Method sparkling wine is, at its core, an act of optimism. You make decisions today that won’t be fully understood for three, five, ten, sometimes fifteen years. You commit to time. You commit to uncertainty. You trust that what you’re building will matter.
That’s what makes Argyle distinctive. Not just that, we’ve been making sparkling wine for a long time. It’s what we believed Oregon could do before the world agreed.
Describe how and what you’d do with your winemaking career or winery business if you were not constrained.
The dream is already in motion, honestly. We’re farming regeneratively across all of our vineyards, with Lonestar farmed organically and Spirithill moving in that direction. For me, the vision is to go deeper, to let that commitment to the land express itself more fully in every wine we make. A winery within a winery. Smaller lots, more intentional farming, wines that are a direct mirror of the hard work happening both in the vineyard and in the cellar. Regenerative farming isn’t a trend for us. It’s a belief that the best wines come from the healthiest land, and that the work we do today is an investment in wines we haven’t made yet.
On the sparkling side, we are significantly expanding our long-term aging programs. More extended tirage. More willingness to wait. I’m deeply interested in how Oregon expresses itself not just at 3 to 5 years on lees, but at 8, 10, 20. We are only beginning to understand that potential, and I find that genuinely thrilling.
And I would invest in people at the same level as infrastructure, creating space for curiosity, for experimentation, for the kind of slow thinking that great wine actually requires. Because ultimately, the future of this region depends on how we cultivate talent as much as how we cultivate vines.
What is the One Wine most emblematic of your brand and/or winemaking style? Tell us its story.
It’s hard to choose just one wine, because I don’t believe a single wine can fully define a philosophy. But I will say this: my story at Argyle is still unfolding. I have two tirage bottlings under my belt, and some of my still wines will be released this year, but most of the wines that will demonstrate my style will take considerably more time.
So if you ask me what wine best embodies my winemaking style, I’d say it’s the one that isn’t ready yet. The one still aging, and revealing itself. Patience isn’t just a virtue in Traditional Method sparkling wine. It is the craft itself. That said, at the moment, I’m particularly loving the 2015 Extended Tirage Brut, and I think it’s a great one for you to try! Read my review of this exceptional extended tirage sparkling wine.
Bonus Question: Why Winemaking?
Winemaking lives at the intersection of art and science, and I’ve never found anywhere else I’d rather be. But what truly drives me is the tangible, human dimension of it. You make something with your hands and your mind, and years later someone opens that bottle and it evokes a memory, a place, a moment in time. Wine brings people together in a way very few things can.