Terravino 2025 has awarded its Lifetime Achievement Award to Tali Sandovski of the Golan Heights Winery. Terravino is the only international wines & spirits competition in Israel. The competition is celebrating its 20th year. The idea and concept was created and developed by Haim Gan, and since then it has been organized by him strictly according to OIV guidelines.
The awards ceremony took place at Ish Anavim – The Grape Man, a center of wine culture, wine events and wine education, owned by Haim Gan in Jaffa. The last five winners of this prestigious award were:
- Yonatan Tishbi of Tishbi Winery
- Uri Shaked of Shaked Bros.
- Dr. Yair Margalit of Margalit Winery
- Eli Ben-Zaken of Domaine du Castel
- Adam Montefiore, ex- Golan Heights Winery & Carmel.
Tali Sandovski joined the Golan Heights Winery in 1986, thirty-nine years ago. She has served under all of the winery’s six CEO’s from Shimshon Welner onwards until Assaf Ben Dov today. Tali was a pioneer being the first Israeli winemaker to graduate in oenology and she was the first woman winemaker in Israel. She looked after the R&D Pilot Winery at the Golan Heights Winery, played a part in the developing the famous traditional method sparkling wines of Yarden and every pioneering step since then. She was most associated with a series of award-winning creative dessert wines, but has had a finger in every pie of the winery’s success. She is now Senior Winemaker under Head Winemaker, Victor Schoenfeld.
Tali Sandovski is only the second woman to have won this award, after the late Carmi Lebenstein z”l of Carmel. She was presented with her prize by two past Lifetime Award laureates, Adam Montefiore and Uri Shaked, both of whom have had past connections with the Golan Heights Winery.
Tali Sandovski has done wonderful work under the radar and often out of the public eye. She has played an enormous part in the success of the Golan Heights Winery, which has done so much to change Israeli wine, and fully deserves this recognition.
Photograph, from right to left: Adam Montefiore, Tali Sandovski, Haim Gan, Uri Shaked.
Credit: Maxim Dinshtein.
