Vintners are taking the long view. They figure that Sevastopol needs at least another decade to develop as a distinctive wine-producing region. The winemakers are still experimenting with which grape will produce the best wine for their appellation.

Mr. Shvets, for example, has planted 12 varieties on his 17 acres under cultivation. So far, pinot noir has produced the best red wine, and riesling and chardonnay the best whites, but a decision is still years away, he said.

Overall wine consumption goes up about 5 percent annually in Russia, Mr. Shvets said, with Russians now drinking one billion liters a year. Yet, Russia cultivates only about 160,000 acres of vineyards, compared with twice that in Bordeaux alone, he noted, and Russian consumers still equate good wine with France or Italy.

“Russian wine is not very popular because people don’t know anything about it,” Mr. Shvets said. “They do not understand that it is possible to produce good wine in Russia.”

The giant Soviet wineries did not entirely ignore the idea of creating a distinctive brand, but they did it with a certain twist. One collective farm on the outskirts of Sevastopol, for example, added a soupçon of Bolshevik fervor to its sparkling wine by renaming its vineyards after Sophie Perovski, the young woman hanged for assassinating Czar Alexander II.

Her family, titled nobility, once owned the estate, and the wines made there today still carry the name “Perovski Estate Winery.”