UWC Judges

Patricia Savoie
Patricia Savoie
Journalist
Patricia Savoie

Pat Savoie is a wine and culinary travel writer living in New York City.  

She is a frequent contributor to Sommelier Journal magazine, and a regular contributor to Wine Enthusiast magazine since 2003, where she wrote a monthly feature on American Viticultural Areas until March.  Pat has been the wine columnist for ICON magazine since 2003.  ICON is distributed in Hunterdon County and Princeton, NJ, and Bucks County and Philadelphia, PA.

Pat has been Co-Chair of the Wine Media Guild, an organization for professional wine writers, for three years.  She helps organize all of the monthly tastings and the annual Wine Writers’ Hall of Fame induction dinner.  She has been a member of the Society of Wine Educators for several years.

Pat was one of the first to create materials for wine education. After a year-long trip around the world in the early 1970s, she and co-author John Gottfried recognized the need for information for budding wine lovers. The book "A Wine Tasting Course: The Practical Way to Learn about Wine" (McKay & Company 1978) was the first book that taught readers how to learn about wine.

Her articles for Sommelier Journal include in-depth interviews with Randall Grahm, Neal Rosenthal and Michael Chiarello. Her feature articles include new trends in Cognac and the emergence of Okanagan Valley of British Columbia.  A recent article on Jerez’s San Lucar region detailed the terroir responsible for Manzanilla, while an upcoming winery article profiles the Douro’s Quinta do Crasto and the Roquette family.

She also has written for Wine Business Monthly, where her article on the Charbono grape/wine remains the definitive article on that grape/wine. She and a co-author have been asked by a partnership of Fairleigh Dickinson University and The New York Times to create and produce a multi-class course on wine that will be carried on the Times’ online Knowledge Network.

Pat also has experience in the retail wine sector. From 2003 until 2005, she owned and ran a retail wine store in Brooklyn called Big Nose Full Body. It received much praise in the press, including being named by the Village Voice the "Best Neighborhood Wine Store in NYC" in 2004.