Grabbing a glass of wine at Rubato Studio feels like you’re sitting in a friend’s living room. Which is exactly what owners Kenzie Bindrup Fae and Sam Traver Fae intended.
The duo started pouring out of their new tasting room in the industrial Central Eastside in early September. They’re there to introduce people to their wines, yes, but it’s almost profound how approachable they are while doing it. In an industry that’s oft-accused of being “closed-door,” Rubato wants to invite everyone in.
The sunlit second-story space in a former warehouse is set up with two eggplant-colored couches and matching stools. Vibrant yellow marigolds and deep pink amaranthus spill out of vases on the powder-blue bar, and jewel-toned glassware lines sleek wood shelves next to abstract Justin Gage paintings. It’s colorful, cool, and very relaxed. Traver Fae even hand-built most of the furniture himself.
“The space really is an extension of our home,” Bindrup Fae says.
Rubato can comfortably host about eight people at a time—reservations, made via direct message on Rubato’s Instagram page, are recommended, since the space is cozy. Since the majority of the seating is couch-based, the likelihood of getting to know your neighbors is quite high. Bindrup Fae was initially nervous about that aspect, but it’s now one of her favorite parts of the experience.
“Everything really comes back to that feeling of being at someone’s house,” she says. “You can get a glass, some snacks, talk with your new friends—communal seating win!”
Bindrup Fae and Traver Fae worked on Rubato’s food menu with Kevin Nguyen Do of NE Broadway bar/restaurant After Ours. Nguyen Do’s background is in Vietnamese cuisine and Bindrup Fae is half Korean, so they dreamed up a series of umami-rich drinking snacks, like, a Chex Mix flecked with brown butter furikake that is so good, customers are already asking for to-go bags of it, or a dilly French onion dip served with salmon roe and shrimp chips. This winter, they plan to expand into medium-to-large plates, too.
“Wine bar food but with a little Asian twist,” Bindrup Fae says. “The kind of snacks we’d make if we were having friends over.”
Another collaborative aspect of Rubato is its location. The converted warehouse on SE Salmon houses tasting rooms for Statera Cellars and Idle Time, plus a sake bar (Sake Desu) in close apartment-like quarters; Buona Notte’s wine bar, The Stazione, is downstairs. As a group, they’ve started calling it the “Juice Blocks.”
Right now, access isn’t super obvious—you buzz up from the street level, where a small, directory placard hangs. It’s kind of “if you know, you know.” Bindrup Fae and the other winery owners are working together to beef up signage, add more seating, and build out the cavernous event space at the end of their shared hallway, with the hope that it will make the upstairs feel more connected.
“The dream is that you could come with a group of friends and there’s something for everybody,” Bindrup Fae says. “Someone can do a sake flight, someone grabs a glass of Pinot, someone else does a wine flight, and then everyone can meet back at the same table.”
All Rubato tastings kick off with a splash of their sparkling wine, “Sunspill,” made with Columbia Gorge aligoté. The tasting, for $25, includes five other Rubato wines, with Bindrup Fae and her staff talking through them in a low-key, friendly way. Encore, a skin contact pinot gris and Gewürtztraminer, is a gorgeous terracotta color with a faintly floral undertone. To close, there’s a Nouveau Grenache (Veloce) whose tasting notes include “cherry Tootsie Roll.” And if you find something you like and want to take it home, all bottles are priced at $26.
“I don’t need you to remember every tasting note or even the name of the grape,” Bindrup Fae says. “I want you to remember how you felt when you drank it.”
Growing up Mormon in Utah, Bindrup Fae didn’t start drinking herself until her late twenties. When she became curious about wine, she was met with tepid acknowledgement at best, pretentiousness at worst. After working in events, social media, and other hospitality-adjacent roles, she found her way into working harvests, bottling wines and pouring in prominent Willamette Valley tasting rooms—saying yes to every opportunity, trying to learn wherever she could.
“I remember pressure washing the press and having this very clear thought: This is so much fun, I could do this for the rest of my life.”
Shortly thereafter, while walking through the Bednarik Vineyard property, Bindrup Fae was handed a cluster of Pinot grapes and encouraged to taste them pre-fermentation. That’s when everything changed.
“It was like the fruit’s life flashed before my eyes,” Bindrup Fae says. “Something clicked for me. Wine stopped being this abstract thing you were supposed to know how to talk about and became something physical and alive.”
Instead of noticing the more traditional tasting notes, she daydreamed about how the wine would be drunk—in celebration, in mourning, after hard days.
“You can collect beautiful wine. You can cellar it. You can learn every technical detail about it. But ultimately, it’s meant to be shared with humans.”
Rubato itself sprung from a shared experience, too. Traver Fae met Jeff Wilson, the couple’s business partner, through mutual connections in the music industry. Wilson had just started his own record label when he heard of an opportunity to take over the SE Clinton space that previously held beloved natural wine bar, Bar Norman. Traver Fae’s background in brand building (having started local leather company, Tanner Goods) made him keen to help Wilson develop the idea. Together, they created what is now the “wine and sound” bar, Daydream.
“Because Sam is such a product person, he thought that if we have this wine bar, we should have something of our own to pour,” says Bindrup Fae.
And so Rubato was born—originally as a house wine for Daydream. The pair worked with Kate Norris and Tom Monroe at Division Winemaking Company to actually produce the wine. The word rubato comes from a musical term that translates to “stolen time,” but also describes playing freely without being held to tempo. Bindrup leans into that concept when pouring.
“I’ll joke that when Rubato is in your glass, we’re stealing your time,” she says. “You gave us these two hours and they’re ours now. But underneath the joke is something we really believe in. It’s our way of saying—forget about the clock, be where you are.”
At its core, Bindrup Fae calls Rubato a “feeling brand.” So much so, she’s actually in the process of developing a “flight by feeling.” Instead of selecting wines based on grape variety, guests will be able to choose based on imagery, texture and, most importantly, instinct.
“I never want someone to walk into Rubato and feel like they need to have the right vocabulary before they’re allowed to be curious,” says Bindrup Fae. “I want people to come in, have an experience, learn something without feeling like they’re being taught, and leave feeling like family.”
Rubato Studio, 109 SE Salmon, Thurs-Sat 5 pm-9 pm, rubatowines.com, @rubatowines