Artisan winery L’Ecole N° 41 will open its first Western Washington location in The Schoolhouse District’s “Wine Walk Row” in downtown Woodinville in June, the district’s developers announced.
L’Ecole will occupy 1,415 square feet in the Wine Walk Row, which provides a curated collection of winetasting rooms.
“At L’Ecole, we’ve long-considered expanding our flagship Walla Walla Valley location into Seattle and especially the Woodinville area, but nothing has ever turned our heads quite like Wine Walk Row at The Schoolhouse District,” Marty Clubb, managing winemaker and co-owner of L’Ecole, said in a news release.
In Woodinville, L’Ecole will offer a tasting experience for those discovering their wines for the first time, focused on education about the Walla Walla Valley and the company’s varietals. L’Ecole’s Walla Walla location is in a former schoolhouse from 1915 featured on its labels. The winery name, L’Ecole N° 41 — French for “the school” located in school district 41 — salutes French Canadians who settled in that area in the early 1800s and, legend has it, later planted wine grapes and made wine in the area, according to the winery’s website.
Kirkland-based real estate developer MainStreet Property Group LLC, with its partners HAL Real Estate and the City of Woodinville, completed The Schoolhouse District project last fall. It includes the 264-unit residential community District Flats; the fully-restored historic Schoolhouse No. 23 — future home of Walla Walla Steak Co. & Crossbuck Brewing; Wine Walk Row, with nine curated wine tasting and retail spaces; and additional ground-level retail space leased to local businesses.