The Sonoma Table

Dame Susan Kornblatt Idell has taken an unusual route into the wine industry. Susan has lived in California for 50 years, but her grandmother was a cook and her grandfather first entered the food and wine business as a server in the “Borscht Belt” of Kosher resorts in New York. Eventually the family ran hugely successful bakeries in Brooklyn, where Susan grew up.

Susan attended Boston University, graduated from San Francisco State University, studied French at the University of Montreal, and then spent five good years as a “ski bum” in Vermont and in Tahoe. Then Susan earned her MA in Art Therapy from San Francisco State, taught art in a nursing home, and (of course) developed curricula in gerontology at UCSF and for On Lok Senior Health Services in San Francisco. As a friend, I remember her deep commitment to caring for both her mother and stepmother as they neared the end of their lives.

In 1970 she went to a party at a friend’s house in Berkeley and met a guy named Richard Idell, who became a super entertainment lawyer and smartly bought a secret house in Bolinas way back in 1976.  A while later, in 1988, Susan and Richard got married and lived in San Francisco for almost 20 years, then Mill Valley for another 20 years, and eventually migrated north (like many of us) to Sonoma Valley in 2010. As they approached our wine country, their goal was to find a couple of acres for a home overlooking other people’s vineyards. 

The Idells found a slightly rocky piece of property on the west side of Sonoma Valley and “made the mistake of falling in love with it,” according to Susan. It turned out to fall under the Williamson Act for farmers on what had been the original Carriger estate. The Williamson Act, also known as the California Land Conservation Act (1965), preserves and protects agricultural land, and provides taxation on land as agricultural property and not higher for its development potential.

Sonoma County would allow them to plant grapes or olives, so they chose grapes. Steve Matthiasson joined them as vineyard partner resulting in their Michael Mara Chardonnay vineyard and their Oscar Syrah vineyard, the latter named for Susan’s father. Richard Idell surprised himself by catching the winemaking bug, oversees the vineyard, and loves meeting other people in the business. 

Now as Proprietor and CEO of Idell Family Vineyards, Susan manages the business end including sales, grape contracts, compliance, bottling, marketing, and their enormous and widespread “wine philanthropy,” as she calls it. While they do sell their wines through restaurants, they are also known for donating generous pours at their favorite non-profits’ fundraising events throughout San Francisco and the North Bay, including Les Dames d’Escoffier.

While all of this was going on, Susan was elected in 2020 to and still serves on the Board of Directors of Sonoma Valley Hospital District, has hosted tasting conferences where winemakers who use Idell grapes share tastings and information, organized roundtables for Women for WineSense and served on their national board of directors, served on the Sonoma County Area Agency on Aging Advisory Council as well as on many distinguished panels and organizations on gerontology. In whatever free time she has, she also cans and makes tasty treats that she gifts to friends with beautifully designed labels attached.

We are all lucky to have Susan Kornblatt Idell with us as a distinguished Dame. Thank you, Susan, for all you do!

—Written by Dame Kathleen Thompson Hill