{
 "schema": 1,
 "id": "sta-rita-hills",
 "type": "region",
 "names": {
  "name": "Sta. Rita Hills",
  "aliases": [
   "Santa Rita Hills"
  ]
 },
 "region": [
  "sta-rita-hills",
  "santa-barbara",
  "california"
 ],
 "facets": {
  "country": "United States",
  "level": "sub-ava",
  "established": 2001,
  "soil": "diatomaceous shale, sandy loam"
 },
 "text": {
  "what": "A wind tunnel between Buellton and Lompoc where the Santa Ynez Valley opens west to the ocean. Fog in the morning, thirty-knot afternoons, and some of the slowest ripening in California.",
  "story": "Petitioned by growers inside the Santa Ynez Valley AVA who wanted their own name, and established as Santa Rita Hills in 2001. Chile's Viña Santa Rita objected; the TTB shortened it to Sta. Rita Hills in 2005, and the label now carries an abbreviation nobody says out loud."
 },
 "kin": [
  {
   "to": "santa-maria-valley",
   "as": "The county's other pinot valley, half an hour north.",
   "rel": "neighbour"
  },
  {
   "to": "sanford-and-benedict",
   "as": "The 1971 planting that proved the ground.",
   "rel": "vineyard"
  },
  {
   "to": "richard-sanford",
   "as": "Who read the weather maps and picked this gap.",
   "rel": "person"
  }
 ],
 "geo": {
  "lat": 34.63,
  "lon": -120.4,
  "precision": "region"
 },
 "sources": [
  "s:wp-sta-rita-hills-ava",
  "s:ecfr-27-9"
 ],
 "provenance": {
  "default": {
   "tier": "cited"
  }
 },
 "measures": [
  {
   "key": "acres",
   "label": "AVA area at designation",
   "value": 30720,
   "unit": "acres",
   "year": 2001,
   "source": "s:wp-sta-rita-hills-ava",
   "tier": "cited"
  }
 ],
 "recognitions": [
  {
   "by": "ttb",
   "what": "American Viticultural Area, established 2001",
   "year": 2001,
   "source": "s:ecfr-27-9",
   "note": "66 FR 29479, May 31, 2001; renamed 70 FR 72713, Dec. 7, 2005"
  }
 ],
 "confidence": "high",
 "updated": "2026-09-16",
 "blurb": "A wind tunnel between Buellton and Lompoc where the Santa Ynez Valley opens west to the ocean. Fog in the morning, thirty-knot afternoons, and some of the slowest ripening in California.",
 "region_terms": [
  {
   "key": "sta-rita-hills",
   "name": "Sta. Rita Hills",
   "country": "United States",
   "note": "a wind tunnel between Buellton and Lompoc"
  },
  {
   "key": "santa-barbara",
   "name": "Santa Barbara County",
   "country": "United States",
   "note": "the transverse ranges turn the valleys east-west and let the ocean in"
  },
  {
   "key": "california",
   "name": "California",
   "country": "United States",
   "note": "from Anderson Valley to the Santa Maria bench, wherever fog reaches"
  }
 ],
 "kin_out": [
  {
   "to": "santa-maria-valley",
   "type": "region",
   "name": "Santa Maria Valley",
   "as": "The county's other pinot valley, half an hour north.",
   "rel": "neighbour"
  },
  {
   "to": "sanford-and-benedict",
   "type": "vineyard",
   "name": "Sanford & Benedict",
   "as": "The 1971 planting that proved the ground.",
   "rel": "vineyard"
  },
  {
   "to": "richard-sanford",
   "type": "person",
   "name": "Richard Sanford",
   "as": "Who read the weather maps and picked this gap.",
   "rel": "person"
  }
 ],
 "source_list": [
  {
   "id": "s:wp-sta-rita-hills-ava",
   "kind": "encyclopaedia",
   "title": "Sta. Rita Hills AVA",
   "publisher": "Wikipedia",
   "url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/?curid=15415082",
   "permalink": "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1370033962",
   "accessed": "2026-09-16",
   "licence": "CC BY-SA 4.0"
  },
  {
   "id": "s:ecfr-27-9",
   "kind": "regulation",
   "title": "27 CFR part 9 — American Viticultural Areas",
   "publisher": "Electronic Code of Federal Regulations, US Government Publishing Office",
   "url": "https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-27/chapter-I/subchapter-A/part-9",
   "licence": "public domain",
   "note": "the AVA list, each section carrying the Federal Register citation that established it; harvested into data/harvest/ava.json"
  }
 ],
 "tiers": {
  "text.what": {
   "tier": "cited"
  },
  "text.story": {
   "tier": "cited"
  },
  "geo": {
   "tier": "cited"
  }
 },
 "primary_image": null,
 "tag_facts": [],
 "recognition_facts": [
  {
   "key": "ttb",
   "label": "US Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau",
   "what": "American Viticultural Area, established 2001",
   "url": "",
   "year": 2001,
   "source": "s:ecfr-27-9"
  }
 ],
 "acclaim": 1,
 "kin_in": [
  {
   "from": "santa-maria-valley",
   "type": "region",
   "name": "Santa Maria Valley",
   "as": "The county's other pinot valley, half an hour south.",
   "rel": "neighbour"
  },
  {
   "from": "sanford-and-benedict",
   "type": "vineyard",
   "name": "Sanford & Benedict",
   "as": "The AVA drawn around this ground thirty years later.",
   "rel": "region"
  },
  {
   "from": "richard-sanford",
   "type": "person",
   "name": "Richard Sanford",
   "as": "The AVA drawn around that ground in 2001.",
   "rel": "region"
  },
  {
   "from": "santa-barbara-vintners",
   "type": "org",
   "name": "Santa Barbara Vintners",
   "as": "And the other.",
   "rel": "region"
  },
  {
   "from": "ttb",
   "type": "org",
   "name": "TTB",
   "as": "And renamed by the TTB in 2005 after a trademark objection.",
   "rel": "region"
  },
  {
   "from": "world-of-pinot-noir",
   "type": "event",
   "name": "World of Pinot Noir",
   "as": "And the other local AVA.",
   "rel": "region"
  },
  {
   "from": "the-sideways-effect",
   "type": "story",
   "name": "One film, measured",
   "as": "Where much of it was filmed.",
   "rel": "region"
  }
 ]
}