Heath Porter

Heath Porter, Director of Wine

Ironically, Heath Porter grew up in a dry county in North Alabama, under a roof where alcohol was not allowed. He started his food and beverage career at the ripe age of 15, washing dishes at a truck stop. After high school he moved to Hawaii at age 18, and in the next few years worked in every position in a restaurant setting; from cook, busser, server, all the way up the ladder. Eventually he began reading about wine and attending tastings to develop his palate, all as a means to gain better shifts as a waiter and bartender. He quickly fell in love with the concept of food and wine and was the winner of the Best Young Sommelier competition, Pacific region, and finalist in the 2004 National Chaine des Rotisseurs Young Sommelier Competition. He worked as a wine steward in Honolulu then rose to General Manager and Wine Director at W Hotel's Diamond Head Grill.

In 2006 Porter built Sea Island's wine collection as the lone sommelier for the Cloister. He selected the inventory, trained a food and beverage team of 150 and restructured the resort's overall wine training. He also oversaw the entire Wine & Spirits program for over 4 years which resulted in the only resort in the world to obtain 20 Mobil/Forbes stars in the same year, twice 2008/2009.

Heath has achieved many accolades in his profession and last year in 2009 passed the third level of testing administered by the Court of Master sommeliers. This accreditation leaves Porter as an advanced level sommelier with one test remaining to the master's level. In the last 5 years Heath has personally trained over 30 people to the first level sommelier certificate and 3 others to the certified sommelier level. When he's not assisting guests or facilitating special wine events, Porter contributes to various publications, orchestrates wine events for charities, or can be found personally scouring the world's great wine regions for new offerings, from Sonoma to Burgundy to Piedmont or Austria. Porter has twice served as guest sommelier for the annual World of Pinot Noir and the largest charity wine event in the nation, the Naples Winter wine festival and Auction.