Visit Our Feature Exhibit
The Museum Has Been Moved Online and will continue to serve the people of Farmington and Farmington Hills. We will feature items unique to our collection and will be available for lectures. We also plan to continue hosting special events. For more information please call 248-739-4877
The LaSalle Wine company was once the largest winery in Michigan and the third largest in the United States?
LaSalle's Unique Concrete Aging Vats
The LaSalle Winery was converted from an electric powerhouse to a winery therefore several unique features were added in order to produce wine.
One of these features is a series of concrete vats which were used for aging some of the wines at the winery. These vats were made of poured concrete much like a basement is made today. The
only way to get inside through a was a small opening less than 2 feet tall and one foot wide. Looking at the photo links to the right of this paragraph, vat1 is the outside view
of an opening which has been covered. If you really look you can see the outline of the opening. vat2 and vat5 are photos of the same opening from inside.
These vats were built in the early 1930's and were made of concrete and lined with window glass to seal the vats to keep the wine inside. If you click on the Vat Cellar link to the right you
will see what the exteriors looked like originally. The vats were once individual sealed tanks but doors have been cut into the sides to make doors and to connect them so as to make
larger rooms as the other photos show. Most of these have been converted into small offices.
These vats are unique to The Old Winery and can not be seen in any other winery anywhere else.
