Dominus Estate, is a

California wine California wine production has a rich viticulture history since 1680 when Spanish Jesuit missionaries planted ''Vitis vinifera'' vines native to the Mediterranean region in their established missions to produce wine for religious services. ...

estate producing

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( ; ; Gascon language, Gascon ; ) is a city on the river Garonne in the Gironde Departments of France, department, southwestern France. A port city, it is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the Prefectures in F ...

style blends, owned by Christian Moueix. The

winery A winery is a building or property that produces wine, or a business involved in the cultivation and production of wine, such as a wine company. Some wine companies own many wineries. Besides wine making equipment, larger wineries may also feat ...

is located in Yountville within the

Napa Valley AVA Napa Valley is an American Viticultural Area (AVA) in Napa County, California. The area was established by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) on February 27, 1981, after a 1978 petition submitted by the Napa Valley Vin ...

History

George C. Yount, the founder of Yountville, planted in 1836 the first vines of the valley on the location of Napanook vineyard. In 1850 the property was bought by Charles Hopper, and owners since include Hugh La Rue, a pioneer in the use of

rootstock A rootstock is part of a plant, often an underground part, from which new above-ground growth can be produced. It could also be described as a stem with a well developed root system, to which a bud from another plant is grafted. It can refer to ...

and John Daniel Jr., the owner of

Inglenook Winery Inglenook is a winery that produces estate bottled wines in Rutherford, California, in the Napa Valley AVA, Napa Valley. History The winery was founded in 1879 by a Finnish Gustave Niebaum, Sea Captain Gustave Niebaum. Niebaum's employee Hamden ...

who bought the estate in 1946. Following Daniel's death in 1970, Napanook passed to his daughters Robin Lail and Marcia Smith who in 1982 began a partnership with Christian Moueix, acting on a recommendation by Robert Mondavi to establish production in Napa Valley. Daniel Baron became general manager of Dominus in the 1980s. Moueix, also in charge of production at Château Pétrus and president of Établissements Jean-Pierre Moueix, became the sole owner of Dominus Estate when Lail and Smith sold their shares in 1995. Napanook, the estate's

second wine Second wine or second label (French: ''Second vin'') is a term commonly associated with Bordeaux wine to refer to a second label wine made from '' cuvee'' not selected for use in the ''Grand vin'' or first label. In some cases a third wine or e ...

, was first released in 1996. With the previous thirteen vintages crushed and aged at the nearby facility Rombauer Winery, a new winery was constructed by the Swiss architects Jaques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron in 1996, a $5 million, structure. The architects' first U.S. project, it was constructed from stone-filled

gabions A gabion (from Italian language, Italian ''gabbione'' meaning "big cage"; from Italian ''gabbia'' and Latin ''cavea'' meaning "cage") is a Cage (enclosure), cage, cylinder (geometry), cylinder or box filled with rocks, concrete, or sometimes s ...

to provide protection from scorching heat by day and the cold at night.Matthews, Kevin, ''ArchitectureWeek'' (June 20, 2007)
"Dominus in Depth"
/ref>

Production

From an estate of , the vineyard area extends in 14 blocks, with some presence of

phylloxera Grape phylloxera is an insect pest of grapevines worldwide, originally native to eastern North America. Grape phylloxera (''Daktulosphaira vitifoliae'' (Fitch 1855) belongs to the family Phylloxeridae, within the order Hemiptera, bugs); orig ...

-resistant St. George rootstock from the Inglenook period, the grape varieties are 87%

Cabernet Sauvignon Cabernet Sauvignon () is one of the world's most widely recognized red wine grape varieties. It is grown in nearly every major wine producing country among a diverse spectrum of climates from Australia and British Columbia, Canada to Lebano ...

, 8%

Petit Verdot Petit Verdot is a variety of red wine grape, principally used in classic Bordeaux blends. It ripens much later than the other varieties in Bordeaux, often too late, so it fell out of favour in its home region. When it does ripen it adds tannin, ...

, and 5%

Cabernet Franc Cabernet Franc is one of the major black grape varieties worldwide. It is principally grown for blending with Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot in the Bordeaux (wine), Bordeaux style, but can also be vinified alone, as in the Loire (wine), Loire's C ...

. The annual production is 7,500 to 12,000 cases which includes both Dominus and Napanook.

References

External links

* {{Coord, 38, 24, 18, N, 122, 22, 26, W, region:US-CA_type:landmark, display=title Wineries in Napa Valley Yountville, California