The Glacier, the Concrete & the Unbound Hand

The story of Free Form begins with a retirement project that refused to retire. In 2005, Christine Coletta — a veteran wine marketer with over two decades in the British Columbia industry — and her husband Steve Lornie, a construction professional of 35 years, purchased a 10-acre property in Summerland on the Okanagan Lake bench. They grew apples and apricots for one season before switching to Pinot Gris in 2006, launching their first label, Haywire — named after the old Canadianism for baling wire that tangled unpredictably, a perfect metaphor for two city slickers becoming farmers. The first vintage, in 2009, was just 168 cases. By 2011, demand had outgrown their garage operation, and Steve put his hard hat back on to build what would become Okanagan Crush Pad — a state-of-the-art winery and custom-crush facility on Fosbery Road in Summerland.

But the true philosophical shift came later. As Okanagan Crush Pad grew — adding the Narrative label for bought-in grapes, and eventually producing 40,000 cases annually across four labels — Coletta and Lornie became increasingly committed to organic farming and low-intervention winemaking. They converted their home vineyard, Switchback, to organic certification. They purchased Secrest Mountain to secure its organic fruit. And they acquired Garnet Valley Ranch — a dramatic 320-acre property with plans for 60–80 acres of vines, including the highest vineyard plot in the region at 680 metres, advised by renowned terroir consultant Pedro Parra to move no more than six inches of earth during contouring, preserving wildlife corridors and native scrub. This was not mere greenwashing; it was a fundamental reorientation of how wine should be made in the Okanagan.

In 2017, this commitment crystallised into Free Form — a standalone label, like Haywire and Narrative, but with a radically different brief: organic grapes, native yeast, no additives, no manipulation, and free of the oak-barrel orthodoxy that defines so much of the valley's output. The project was not about chasing the "natural wine" trend; it was about making wines that reflected their vineyard origins without adulteration. Under the watchful eye of Matt Dumayne, who had joined Okanagan Crush Pad in 2013 from New Zealand with 25 vintages of experience, the Free Form wines began their journey in concrete tanks, clay amphorae, and large-format neutral oak casks — vessels that add texture and complexity without masking the fruit. The first releases — an Ancient Method sparkling and a Vin Gris — were launched in 2018, followed by a Pinot Noir, a skin-contact white, and a Cabernet Franc. Each was a declaration that the Okanagan could produce wines of thought, texture, and place without the crutches of commercial yeast, acidification, or new oak.

The winemaking philosophy at Free Form is distilled in a single sentence: "Using organic grapes, native yeast, no additives, and free of manipulation." This is not a slogan but a technical protocol that governs every decision in the cellar. Under Matt Dumayne's direction, the Free Form wines are fermented in concrete tanks and clay amphorae — vessels chosen specifically for their ability to add texture and complexity without masking varietal character. The winery is notably free of oak barrels and commercial yeasts. Concrete tanks from Sonoma Cast Stone and Nico Velo in Italy line the cellar, alongside large-format neutral oak casks. Dumayne has done extensive comparisons: "The barrel wine is barrel wine, the stainless steel is linear and focused, and the concrete wine may lose a bit of varietal character, but the layers of texture and complexity are through the roof. It's always the better wine." This is winemaking as material science — where the vessel is chosen not for prestige but for the specific texture it imparts.

The extended skin contact is another defining feature. Free Form whites and rosés spend several months on their skins — a technique that provides a stabilising effect, enabling the team to rely on native fermentation and avoid filtering or cold-stabilisation. The Pinot Noir for the Ancient Method sparkling is whole-bunch pressed into 2,000-litre concrete tanks for wild fermentation, then completed in bottle with zero dosage after six months on lees. The Vin Gris is made from Pinot Noir that is whole-bunch pressed to concrete, wild-fermented, and undergoes full malolactic conversion before being bottled unfiltered. The Pinot Noir red is fermented in concrete with 25% whole bunches, spending six weeks on skins before basket pressing back into concrete. The skin-contact white and Cabernet Franc follow similar protocols — native yeast, concrete or amphora, gentle handling, and patience. Little to no sulfites are added; the wines are unfiltered and unfined, bottled with their sediment and their soul intact.

What makes this approach radical in the Okanagan context is Dumayne's fearlessness. He stopped acidifying three years ago, accepting the naturally high pH of Okanagan reds — bottling Pinots at pH 4.0 or 4.1 with total acidity of 6 g/L and trusting that the freshness comes from balance, not numbers. "You can bottle at pH 4.2 with 6 g TA and freshness, so who cares?" he asks. This is not negligence; it is confidence born of experience — 25 vintages across New Zealand and Canada, working with consultants Alberto Antonini and David Scholefield to refine a house style that is rich in texture, balanced in acidity, and alive with bright berry flavours. The Free Form wines are the purest expression of this philosophy: no acid adjustment, no commercial yeast, no enzymes, no fining, no filtration, no new oak, and no dosage. Just grape, time, concrete, and the microbial fingerprint of the vineyard.

Free Form is not merely a wine label; it is a proof that the Okanagan Valley can produce wines of international stature without the crutches of oak, commercial yeast, acidification, or dosage. In an era when the Canadian wine industry is still finding its voice, Christine Coletta, Steve Lornie, and Matt Dumayne demonstrate that the most profound expression of terroir comes not from adding complexity but from refusing to mask it. The same glacial soils that were dismissed as too young and too sandy have produced wines of extraordinary mineral clarity. The same concrete tanks that were considered unconventional have become the signature vessel of a house style defined by texture and purity. And the same native yeasts that conventional wineries fear have become the microbial fingerprint that makes every Free Form bottle a unique, unrepeatable snapshot of a specific vineyard in a specific year.

The legacy of Free Form is the legacy of the patient, unbound hand in Canadian viticulture. The 2017 founding is not a distant memory but a living declaration — a reminder that the best wines are made by teams who trust their vineyards enough to let them speak. The extended skin contact is not a gimmick but a stabilising philosophy — a recognition that the grape skins contain everything the wine needs to find its own balance. The zero-dosage sparkling is not an austerity measure but a statement of confidence — a belief that Pinot Noir from Summerland, fermented in concrete and finished in bottle, is complex enough to stand alone without sugar. And the stone-paper labels are not a design choice but a moral absolute — a refusal to accept that wine packaging requires the destruction of trees and the pollution of water.

The future of the project is tied to the future of Garnet Valley Ranch — to the maturation of the highest vineyard in the Okanagan, to the deepening understanding of how Pinot Noir, Riesling, Chardonnay, Gamay, and Chenin Blanc express themselves at 680 metres above sea level, and to the continued evolution of organic farming under Pedro Parra's terroir philosophy. As the Ancient Method sparkling continues to find its way into the cellars of collectors who understand the value of zero-dosage, mineral-driven fizz, as the Vin Gris proves that Okanagan Pinot Noir can be as thought-provoking in pink as it is in red, as the concrete-aged Pinot Noir demonstrates that Canadian Pinot can rival the great wines of Burgundy and Central Otago in elegance and purity, and as the skin-contact whites introduce a new generation to the textural possibilities of extended maceration, Free Form remains what Coletta and Lornie have always intended it to be: a living experiment in organic viticulture, concrete and amphora winemaking, and absolute respect for the glacial soils of Summerland — structured not by fashion or technology but by patience, place, and the eternal reminder that the best Canadian bottle is sometimes the one that has been left alone in a concrete tank for six months, sealed with nothing but native yeast, and opened with nothing but curiosity. The story of this label is the story of a team who looked at a winery and saw not a factory but a sanctuary — and who proved that the best Okanagan wine is sometimes the one that has been freed from every intervention except time.