I am very excited to introduce you to the first wine from our 2016 vintage, a single vineyard wine: Cuvée Number One.
My winemaking approach
I walk my rows month after month, working very closely with the vineyard team to ensure we obtain beautiful concentration and soft tannin development. We harvest during cold nights and sort fruit in the early morning cluster by cluster. It is a meticulous, hands-on winemaking process with little intervention.
The result, for your enjoyment, is a glass of wine that encompasses complexity and instant gratification with a very intense nose. It’s a wine that is so honest that you can taste the vineyard and the California air on the glass.
The vintage
2016 was a very early vintage and similar to 2015 in that there were fewer eligible crops to harvest. However, the concentration of the fruit and the aromatic intensity was exceptional. The ripening season went slowly, allowing sugars to concentrate while aromas and tasteful tannins developed. The nights were cold and the average daytime temperatures were not too hot. Foggy mornings certainly helped the slow ripening of our Pinot Noir clusters.
Name: Lakeview
Location: Green Valley
Clones: Pommard and 115
Farming: Double guyot, limited bud count, 1.5 clusters per shoot (between 1 to 2 clusters alternating throughout the trellis), leafing enough to allow perfect air flow between the clusters
The harvest
Our harvest started on August 24th for our early ripening vineyards, including the Lakeview site in Green Valley. We finished harvest by Sept. 27th with our Syrah grapes coming from the Santa Lucia Highlands. Overall, I could not be happier with the result of the 2016 wines we crafted.
In the fall, we will release our Donum Pinot Noir, Soberanes Syrah and Pratt Chardonnay. The only missing element in our 2016 release will be our Russian River Valley Chardonnay blend. Being a very small harvest, we didn’t have enough fruit to bottle this year, so we decided to focus our chardonnay efforts on the Pratt single vineyard instead.
The 2016 vintage is only available via our mailing list and through our online store. Wines from our 2015 vintage are still available for purchase as well.
The humbling recognitions in 2017
Last year was an extraordinary year for us at the winery, full of great reviews and critics raving about our limited production wines. And while we put all our efforts on the vineyards and the winemaking process, we realized how little of the news we have shared with all of you.
Rusty Gaffney from PinotFile, a dedicated report on Pinot Noirs and Chardonnays from the United States, has selected the Cuvée Number One 2015 as one of the 2017 California Pinot Noir All-Americans:
A decadent, powerful wine that is yet demure in character with oodles of persuasive fruit goodness fueled by spirited acidity and backed by invisible tannins.
In his dedicated article about Bibiana’s wines, Jeb Dunnuck wrote:
Unquestionably part of the upcoming generation of world-class winemakers who will dominate the California wine scene over the coming decades …
I hope you have been enjoying the 2015 wines and believe the 2016 release will be a great addition to your wine cellar.
Come and visit us soon! We welcome visitors by appointment.
winemaker