A full-bodied ‘full circle’ as Purdue HTM alum vinifies new Boilermaker wine

Morgan Lee (HTM ’06), co-owner of Two Vintners winery in the Seattle area, developed Purdue for Life’s wine release for 2025. The 2022 vintage is a Syrah red nicknamed “The Mall” — inspired by the Purdue Memorial Mall.(Photo provided)

Written by: Tim Brouk, tbrouk@purdue.edu

Morgan Lee’s time in wine came “full-circle” this spring when his 2022 Syrah vintage was selected as the newest Boilermaker bottle for the Purdue for Life Foundation.

Lee, a 2006 alumnus from the Purdue University White Lodging-J.W. Marriott, Jr. School of Hospitality and Tourism Management (HTM), is co-owner of  Two Vintners, a Seattle, Washington, area winery he co-founded at age 27. Lee selected the dry red, which became available on April 1, due to its bold blend of grapes grown in Columbia Valley, Washington. The wine — nicknamed “The Mall” after the Purdue Memorial Mall — pays tribute to the birthplace of Lee’s passion for vino.

During his HTM studies, Lee figured (correctly) that taking the notoriously and deceptively difficult FS 47000 (Wine Appreciation) class offered through Purdue’s Department of Food Science would fit well into his hospitality education portfolio. By semester’s end, Lee knew what he wanted to do for a career.

“That class was definitely the catalyst. I tell people, ‘It either set me on the right path or completely ruined my life.’ It kind of depends on the day,” laughed Lee during a recent phone interview while walking his black labrador, Alice. “I took it for the same reason everybody else took it — because you could drink in class. I mean, let’s just be honest, that was really why that happened, but I didn’t find it hard because I found it fascinating. I really enjoyed it. I loved the reading and the material beyond just the drinking in class, of course, but a lot of people didn’t do well.”

Today, Lee and Two Vintners have two public tasting rooms and a growing reputation on the west coast and now in West Lafayette. Working professionally in wine for 18 years, Lee said he has seen public-facing wineries become more of an “experience” than just setting up customers with small samples of various wines. There’s food, live entertainment and memories to be had, which has him reaching back to his Purdue HTM days.

Lee will unveil a second Purdue for Life vintage in spring 2026.

How did your new passion for wine fit in with your HTM studies?

It certainly fit in. It was very symbiotic to what I was studying because I took the restaurant management portion (of HTM) and that (Wine Appreciation) class really made me get serious about wine in many ways, even within HTM.

Before I graduated, I knew I was going to move on from restaurants and pursue wine. I had worked in kitchens, and my original plan was to go to culinary school after Purdue. But wine changed all that, and I’ve been doing that ever since.

How has your Purdue HTM experience assisted you during the formation and growth of Two Vintners?

My job keeps me in tune with restaurants all over the world. It’s a big part of the culture. So, that training, it all works. So even though I moved away from restaurants professionally, I’m still very in touch with the restaurant scene.

You had to have used some of that knowledge when you opened the tasting rooms. What was that experience like?

When I started Two Vintners, it was just sort of a project to scratch an itch. And then when the brand started to take off and be recognized, I realized we should probably have a tasting room. So, we’ve had a couple different iterations of the tasting room. The one that’s online now a new remodel that we did a couple years ago. And the wine industry, there are still people who come just to taste wine, but a lot of it has changed over the years. There’s a lot of, let’s just say, extras that people want to be a part of. They want an experience.

“The Mall” by Two Vintners(Photo provided)

We have a commercial kitchen and a chef to do catering if people want to do events. So, if you go back to all that hospitality management education, it really plays in. I always tell people making wine is the easy part. It’s the part I love the most: the creation and working with vineyards and the farmers. That’s the easy part you do a couple months of the year and then the other 10 months of the year, you’ve got to sell. You’ve got to win hearts and minds, and you have to have a great product.

What were the most important aspects of your Purdue HTM studies?

The classwork was essential to getting the degree and getting through it, but the enduring part of my time there was the relationships that I made with some of the professors. Those are the people I’m still in touch with and now getting reengaged with via Purdue for Life. It’s a pretty fun, full-circle thing, right? I took those experiences, and I took those relationships into my professional world.

What are your thoughts on releasing a wine for Purdue for Life?

It was just a great opportunity. I can’t see a downside. It’s awesome.

One thing I’m really proud of here (at Two Vintners) is our Syrah. Kind of my building block for Two Vintners was Syrah production. So that was what I wanted to push forward with, and fortunately, they were in enthusiastic agreement to do that. … For me to be able to support Purdue in this way is awesome.