Joey Tensley hails from dusty Bakersfield, smiles through kinda crooked teeth, hangs with England’s roughest soccer hooligans, and swears like a pirate.
But the forty-something makes some of the sweetest syrah on the Central Coast, and, as a consultant for wineries throughout South America, is Santa Barbara’s best version of a “flying winemaker,” those globe-trotting vintners whose touch turns associated brands into liquid gold. His facility inside Roblar Winery — just a short walk from his home near the Dunn School, which his 12-year-old son, Oliver, attends — is also home to other respected projects, from the Lea label of his New Orleans–raised wife, Jennifer, and his assistant winemaker Zac Wasserman’s Frequency brand (see sidebar) to Carina Cellars, Ferguson Crest (owned by Fergie of Black Eyed Peas fame), and Rome-born, Las Vegas sommelier-turned-vintner friend Paolo Barbieri’s eponymous line.
“I used to tell my girlfriend in high school that I’d be a winemaker one day,” said Tensley, who learned about wine on a soccer trip to Bordeaux at age 12 and came to Santa Barbara City College upon graduation. “And as soon as I turned 21, I got into the business.” He started on the bottling line at Fess Parker Winery in 1992, followed that with his first harvest in ’93, and then learned winemaking through jobs at Babcock and Beckmen, where he was offered space to start his own project in 1998.