O’Brien Estate is farmed and made by a small team on the estate itself — the same 33 acres of vineyard, the same cellar, from vine to bottle.
Our Winemaking
We follow a classic French approach to winemaking: minimal intervention, so the vineyard speaks for itself. We use no additives beyond a minimal amount of sulfur. We never filter our red wines, and we never cold-stabilize our whites, so you may occasionally find small tartrate crystals, sometimes called “wine diamonds,” in a bottle of our white wine. They are harmless and a natural sign of a wine that hasn’t been stripped down. Our red wines ferment in stainless steel tanks; our whites ferment in a combination of stainless steel and neutral French oak barrels.
All of our wines age in French oak from renowned multi-generation coopers such as Darnajou and Taransaud. We don’t economize on barrels. Our reds age in about 75% new oak, a high proportion by any standard, for 18 to 20 months. Our Chardonnay ages in 33% new oak. Our white wines spend 10 months in barrel, except the Reserve Chardonnay, which spends 18.
Every wine is blended just before bottling. By then, each lot has its own voice, shaped by its varietal, irrigation block, clone, and the individual barrel it aged in, since no two barrels are identical. Blending is where our winemaker brings those voices together into the music of a fine wine.
After bottling, our wines rest in bottle for at least another 18 months before release. They are delicious when released, and our reds can continue to age gracefully for up to 20 years.
Come Walk the Vineyard
Walk our vineyard, touch the barrels, and sit in our backyard with a glass of something extraordinary. You’ll see why we ask — is this heaven?