Located in Hamilton, Loudoun County, along Charles Town Pike. Firefly opened their doors in May 2021, after purchasing and remodeling the old Hunters Run Winery. Firefly is owned by the Pierleonardi family, who owned other businesses in the county, and Andrea Zaidi. This winery is not to be confused with similarly-named Firefly Hills Vineyards, which was located in Elliston, in the Blue Ridge, and which closed its doors in 2021.
Wine: As was the case in its Hunter Ridge incarnation, the winery continues to use the services of Randy Phillips of Cave Ridge winery as its winemaker. Grapes are primarily sourced from the Shenandoah Valley, though there is a Chambourcin planting on site. Wines of note include their Chambourcin and Cabernet Franc reds, as well as a white wine blend, Illumination. The winery has yet to enter tasting competitions.
Setting: The tasting room has been completely remodeled from its days as Hunters’ Run, and a cellar for tasting events along with an outdoor space have been added by the Pierleonardis. The cellar can be booked for hour-long guided tastings with the Pieleonardis. Children and pets are allowed outdoors but not inside. There is also a new Airbnb on the property for those wishing to make it an overnight venture.
Stories. Virginia History: an escape from Malarial Washington. The village of Paeonian Springs is named after Paean, the ancient Greek physician of the gods. It was developed in the late 1800s as a resort town for Washingtonians trying to escape the Summer heat and malaria of the District of Columbia. While the young capital of the country was not in fact built on a malarial swamp, as urban legends often have it, it did have extensive tidal marches, and the National Mall was prone to floods which provided breeding grounds for mosquitos. George Washington suffered from lifelong bouts of malaria, and the mosquito-borne menace was so prevalent in Washington that in the late 1800s, a prominent physician petitioned for a wire mosquito net as tall as the Washington Monument to be erected over the city. Enterprising entrepreneur Theodore Milton founded the Paeonian Springs Company in 1890 to develop the village as a resort town and market the local spring’s water’s healing properties. Paeonian Springs water was touted as “a fountain of health flowing out of the deep rock ribs of the Catoctin Mountain for the healing of the people.” He took advantage of the passage of the Washington & Old Dominion railroad – which made eight stops a day in the village in the early 20th century. The town flourished until the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 called into question many of the health claims made about the water. Shame about those health standards…