It started with a dream…
It started with a dream…
…to build a world-class estate vineyard and winery producing the highest rated wines in its class.
In 2004, Jill and Bryan lived and worked in Silicon Valley and were looking for a new home. Both Jill and Bryan worked in the high-tech industry at companies like Apple Computer, Deloitte Consulting and Oracle Corporation where Jill still works. Bryan was an avid wine collector, on all of the “cult wine” mailing lists and had a cellar of over 2000 bottles of wine from the top producers in France, Italy, and California.
In looking for their next home, Jill and Bryan expanded their search from Silicon Valley to the surrounding wine regions in an effort to build a home for the long-term — to build a world-class vineyard and winery. Wanting only the best life has to offer, Sol Rouge Vineyard and Winery was born.
It started with the vineyard…
In January of 2005, Jill and Bryan found a 70 acre, mountain-side property in the Red Hills of Lake County. It was an abandoned walnut orchard situated on the side of Mt. Konocti, one of Lake County tallest peaks with slopes from 20% to over 50%. It was the perfect property to develop a world-class, high-elevation, mountain-side vineyard.
To develop the highest quality vineyard, Sol Rouge Vineyard was planted using a high vine density planting - a technique used in French to produce higher quality wines. Although this technique is 4-6 times the cost of a traditional vineyard, Jill and Bryan spared no expense to produce the highest quality grapes possible. In 2006, the vineyard was planted with nine different varietals with twenty different clones. Sol Rouge Vineyard was born.
Developed into an estate winery…
In 2009, on the vineyard’s fourth leaf, Sol Rouge Vineyard produced its first full harvest allow our first estate wines to be released. Although some blocks, like the Cinsaut which is planted at the top of the vineyard at over 50% slopes, took longer to produce a first harvest, Sol Rouge Vineyard was able to produce most of its estate bottlings including our signature Châteauneuf-du-Pape inspired blend — Gypsy Rouge. In this vintage, the vineyard was also able to produce its first Cabernet Franc, which was original planted as a blender, but was bottled on its own. Good thing it was bottled on its own as the San Francisco Chronicle named the 2009 Cabernet Franc the “Top Cabernet Franc in America”. So, from the beginning, Sol Rouge was a winner, and, today, Sol Rouge continues to produce world-class wine that rivals that of the top wines from France and Napa Valley.
The dream continues…
Looking back over a decade and a half, we have achieved our goal of building a world-class estate vineyard and winery producing the highest rated wines in its class.
In 2013, Sol Rouge was the first winery in Lake County to receive a 94 point rating by one of the Big 3 (Wine Spectator, Wine Enthusiast, and Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate)
Two years later, Sol Rouge was the first winery in Lake County to receive 90+ point ratings on all of its wines (all 12 wines)
Recently, Sol Rouge was the first winery in Lake County to receive a score higher than 95 points one of the Big 3 Wine Rating Magazines with a 96 point rating from Wine Enthusiast Magazine. Plus, Sol Rouge was named to the Top 100 Wines of the Year list with the #25 wine in the world, the first time a Lake County wine was named to a Top 100 list from a major magazine (outside of a Top 100 Best Buys list).
Tomorrow — who knows!
Sol Rouge continues to be driven by our goal to produce the highest rated wines in its class - in the Red Hills, in Lake County, in the North Coast, in California, and in the world!