Ria’s Wines

Founded in 2022 by wife-and-husband duo Ria D’Aversa and Michael Penn, Ria’s Wines is a winery, vineyard, and tasting room on the eastern shores of Seneca Lake in New York’s Finger Lakes. Both Ria and Mike are UC Davis wine program graduates with extensive experience in grape growing and winemaking across California and around the world. The two moved themselves—and their winemaking—to the Finger Lakes in search of both a unique cool-climate terroir and a place to raise their growing family. Ria is particularly focused on work in the vineyard, with a background in viticulture and organic farming, and a role as a professor at Cornell University’s School of Viticulture. Perched just above the deepest part of the lake, their estate vineyard is home to vines up to forty years old, producing Riesling, Cabernet Franc, Lemberger, Chardonnay, Cayuga, and Baco Noir that reflect the distinct energy of the region.

Their approach in the cellar is guided by what they call “thoughtful gestures”—spontaneous fermentations, minimal new oak, no fining, and no additions beyond small doses of sulfur. The result is a collection of wines that feel alive and transparent, channeling the rhythm of the land and the clarity of Seneca Lake. Each bottle is a quiet conversation between place, time, and patience—an honest reflection of the region’s evolving voice and the people devoted to expressing it.