Family-Owned Nokesville Winery Opens New Tasting Room

The Prince William County winemakers offer a welcoming venue for Virginia wine, an hour from Alexandria.

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Food & Dining

The weekend winery visits that started some 20 years ago, when they were dating and the Virginia wine scene was beginning its ascent, have led Dustin and Tara Miner on a grape-stained journey from wine enthusiasts to wine producers.

They’ve gone from learning to appreciate wine to planting vines in their backyard to converting their basement into a winery — not a wine cellar for storing special bottles, but an actual production facility.

Nokesville Winery was initially tucked into the Miners’ suburban Prince William County neighborhood, with vines in the backyard where a garden once flourished and a commercial wine cellar that eventually moved from the basement into a building next to their house that also included a tasting room.

And the growth continues. While the production facility remains, they opened a new tasting room earlier this year in a dedicated space in downtown Nokesville, about an hour’s drive from Alexandria.

“I was the wine drinker first,” recounted Tara. “I would take him to wineries, and I was like, 'Oh, it would be really cool if we owned a winery one day.'”

That was all Dustin needed to hear. 

“I’m thinking, 'Sure, it’d be really cool, but I don’t actually want to do it,'” Tara continued, “and he’s like, 'OK, let’s execute on that.'”

A Shared Dream Takes Root

Those who know the Miners are not surprised by that enthusiastic determination to turn their winemaking dream into reality. 

Tara works as a civilian for the U.S. Marine Corps, while Dustin’s other job is serving as a Prince William County firefighter — specifically as a fire marshal. Because of regulations that prohibit a law enforcement official from holding an alcoholic beverage license, Tara is the owner of Nokesville Winery.

Throughout it all, the winery has been a family affair, with their teenaged children — Janet and Nolan — helping with the chores on the farm, in the cellar and even in the lab where the scientific testing takes place. 

Dustin works as the winemaker. The same background in chemistry that served him as an arson investigator helped him master the science involved in turning grapes into wine.

“We really started in the basement of our house, and it was supposed to be just a small little part-time project that was something that really gave me joy to do,” said Dustin.

But one thing led to another — they got better at making wine, and they won some awards. Soon, people were literally knocking on the front door of their house to try the fruits of their labor.

Then a pair of chance encounters fueled their winemaking fire. 

On a trip to Florida early in their wine journey, Dustin and Tara had their first “aha” wine moment when a waiter paired a Sangiovese wine, an Italian red wine, with their meal — and they understood how wine and food work together. Serendipitously, they crossed paths with him years later when they visited a winery in their home state of Connecticut, where he happened to be working, and his advice helped them establish their vines.

And then Dustin met Jake Blodinger, who previously made the wine at Chrysalis Vineyards in Middleburg. That friendship led to a stint working at Chrysalis, essentially a winemaking education that allowed Dustin to spend hands-on time in the vineyard and the cellar.

Expressing the Soul of Virginia Wine

Understanding how the grapes are grown and the wine is made gave Dustin an even greater appreciation of the Virginia wine industry and its place in the world of wine.

“I always say Virginia wine has so much soul to it,” Dustin said. “I appreciate a Bordeaux. I appreciate a Napa Cabernet Sauvignon. But there’s just something about Virginia wine that it just seems like it has more soul. The wine is different.”

To take advantage of the Commonwealth’s unique climate and growing conditions — its terroir — Nokesville Winery currently cultivates several types of grapes at three locations in Northern Virginia.

Nokesville: This is where Dustin and Tara began with backyard vines. It’s now about 2 acres nestled around their house and production facility, where they primarily grow two American grape varieties, Cayuga and Norton, the grape native to Virginia, along with a small planting of Sangiovese, an Italian variety.

Middleburg: This is where they grow two European varieties that have adapted well to Virginia’s climate — Albariño and Tannat — plus more Norton.

Purcellville: Further north in Loudoun County, they plant Petit Verdot, another European variety that thrives throughout the state.

Drinking Local Supports the Hands that Make the Wine

You can try the resulting wines at Nokesville Winery’s new tasting room at 12905 Fitzwater Dr. in Nokesville, which is currently open Thursday through Sunday. 

The goal for Dustin and Tara is to create a friendly neighborhood space, in the style of a European wine bar, where customers can relax and enjoy local wine and food. Two nearby restaurants — Hector’s of Nokesville and Carini’s Pizzaria — deliver to the tasting room. Plus, there is regularly scheduled live music and trivia nights.

“We want to be like Cheers — where everyone knows your name,” Dustin said.

The couple also wants their customers to know where the wine came from — who grew it and who made it. In the same way the farm-to-table movement has helped consumers understand where their food comes from, the Miners strive to help consumers understand that Virginia wine is also a local agricultural product.

The flip side of that educational goal is making sure their customers aren’t intimidated by wine.

“I hear it all the time,” said Dustin. “A lot of people are like, ‘Well, I just don’t know that much about wine. I wouldn’t enjoy my experience.’ I say that you’re the perfect kind of clientele here.”

Dustin is as approachable as his wine, which ranges from semi-sweet whites to full-bodied reds. “I really think why people love coming here is because it’s not overbearing,” he said. “It’s not pompous in any way, and it’s not scary.”

The Miners also hope their customers will see the value of going to a local venue, whether that’s a winery or store or restaurant, to purchase wine — an economic choice that supports Virginia farmers and winemakers.

“They should feel comfortable choosing to come here, instead of going to the grocery store and buying a $12 bottle, and seeing that this is where it’s made — this is the guy’s hands that made the wine,” he said.

Customers can pick up a bottle from Nokesville Winery at several shops and restaurants in the area — the most offsite locations for any winery in the state. That’s because on days when he wasn’t making wine or working at the fire department, Dustin created a sales route and called on any store or restaurant that carried wine.

“I would go door-to-door, like a vacuum salesman, and go, ‘Hey, would you like to try my wine and see if you could sell it?’ And I literally would just go and pour, and then people would agree to it, and that’s how we started,” he said.

That dedication has paid off. Among the most recent awards, Nokesville Winery took home four silver medals in the 2026 Virginia Governor’s Cup competition for its 2023 Norton, 2024 Albariño, 2024 Petit Verdot, and 2024 Campfire red blend.

“Wine is supposed to be that social thing that you enjoy with people, and that’s something that we’ve always enjoyed,” said Dustin. “Some of the best experiences in our lives were with a bottle of wine and some friends. I remember those bottles for that that aspect of it.”

Jane Fullerton Lemons is a Virginia-based writer and recovering Washington journalist focused on wine and travel. A 2026 fellow at the Wine Writers Symposium in Napa Valley, she shares stories of the people and places behind the bottles, while also helping American consumers understand agriculture and how it impacts their lives. You can follow her work here.

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