For the first time in its 53 years of business, one of the Bay Area’s most prominent wine shops is expanding beyond its Berkeley home.
Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant will open in Larkspur on Tuesday, bringing its selection of French and Italian bottles to Marin Country Mart, the upscale shopping mall that includes restaurants such as Hog Island Oyster Co., El Huarache Loco and Loveski Deli.
The opening is a boon for Marin County’s wine scene. Since Kermit Lynch (the person) began scouring the French countryside in the 1970s for wines with what he calls a “soul” — ones made by hand and that convey the unique mark of the soil in which they grew — Kermit Lynch (the store) has enjoyed a rabid following among Bay Area wine lovers.
The original Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant shop opened in Albany in 1972, then moved down the street to its current location in Berkeley in 1981. In the early years, the store was the entire business, and Lynch would hang up a “gone wine buying” sign to indicate temporary closures when he was off on his scouting trips to Europe. The portfolio now includes just under 200 wineries, all from France or Italy…