Well, it happened. Downtown St. Pete has made a mermaid-inspired winery and boutique a thing.
A collaboration between Desiree Noisette and another local entrepreneur, Jon La Budde, Mermosa — fka Cerulean Blue, Noisette's swim and resort wear shop — recently launched at 400 Beach Drive NE with a refreshing lineup of sparkling wines made from organic grapes. The grapes are sourced from Washington State, and the wines are then finished in Oregon's Willamette Valley.
Mermosa's appropriately dubbed mermaid bar is where customers can sample bubbles on-site in between their swimwear browsing. The wines are meant for "day-to-night" drinking and billed as "the taste of paradise," which means no mermaids were harmed in the production process, right?
In any case, the Beach Drive winery and boutique's namesake, Mermosa (sparkling white wine with orange and pineapple flavors), is 9 percent alcohol by volume, while the Mersecco (sparking white wine) weighs in at 13 percent. Both are available for purchase in elegantly packaged bottles in-house and online.
Also, like, not to get anyone reading this news even more worked up, but a trio of sparklers are also expected to roll out in cans — cans! — fit for waterside sipping sessions at the beach, the pool… you get it. There's the Mermosa, of course, as well as the Mertini (sparkling wine with organic coconut flavor) and the Merjito (sparkling wine with organic lime flavor), which should debut sometime this month.
Along the picturesque waterfront, Mermosa operates 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday.
This article appears in May 17-24, 2018.