561 Cabernet Sauvignon

Vitis vinifera cultivar. The drawing for this print was made in the Bella Oaks Vineyard of Dr. and Mrs. Bernard Rhodes. It was the Rhodeses who began the famous Martha’s Vineyard and then sold it to Tom and Martha May. Now the Bella Oaks Vineyard is a strong competitor with Martha’s Vineyard, Diamond Creek Vineyards, Robert Mondavi Winery, and a few others. There is no shortage of fine red wine in the Napa Valley. Long considered one of the noblest grapes, Cabernet Sauvignon produces a much bigger wine in the Napa Valley than it does in France. As beautiful as a ripe wheat field, the vineyard casts its spell in quite another way. When the bunches hang heavy and ripe, and nothing has disturbed the dusty bloom on the tight skin of the grape, the sun pours its goodness down, perfecting the juice day by day. To me, the vineyard represents the promise of the future, vintages to come, and wine to be drunk in future years. —Henry Evans
$150.00 each.

558 Chardonnay

Vitis vinifera cultivar. Drawn at the Mount Veeder vineyard of Domaine Chandon. All of the grapes of great importance in the production of wine are descended or were developed from the European species, Vitis vinifera. This species includes both wine grapes and table grapes. Waverly Root estimated there are about 8000 cultivars. Nearly 20 centuries ago, Pliny described 90 kinds of grapes. The Romans grew certain grapes for wine and others for the table. They also had favorites for making raisins for the winter. —Henry Evans
$150.00 each.

272 Grenache

Vitis vinifera cultivar. This is one of a series of fourteen wine-grape varieties that Henry drew in the Napa Valley in the fall of 1974. The fourteen varieties were the ones used at that time by the Robert Mondavi Winery. The complete series of prints was exhibited at the winery in 1975. As Henry noted in one of our catalogs, “Out in the vineyard in late summer and early fall, the heat is very intense, and drawing can be both idyllic and very difficult, all at once. The growers were, without exception, very gracious about letting us tramp through their precious vineyards. To rhapsodize on the beauties of Napa Valley wine must be left to the winemakers and the connoisseurs; suffice it to say that we enjoyed the great beauty of the vineyards and the subtle flavors of the wine.” —Marsha Onomiya Evans
$150.00 each.

274 Petite Sirah

Vitis vinifera cultivar. Drawn at the Cyril Saviez Vineyard on the Silverado Trail near Calistoga in September, 1974. Although this wine is bottled as a varietal and can be a great success as a light, cooling beverage, its origin is still uncertain. Not to be confused with the “noble” Petite Syrah of the Rhone region, it is probably an American name for the Duriff variety. One can easily be amused by the wine buffs and their preoccupation with the lineage and origin of the various vines. The ultimate test of the grape is what comes out of the bottle. As I made the drawing for this print, I was taken with the motion and dynamism to be seen in the curves of the stems. —Henry Evans
$150.00 each.

557 Pinot Noir

Vitis vinifera cultivar. Drawn in Jack and Jamie Davies’ Schramsberg Vineyards. Schramsberg had an early reputation for fine wine and early California-style hospitality. Robert Louis Stevenson was a guest there in 1880, and he did a chapter about Schramsberg in his Silverado Squatters. Often one of the chief ingredients of the best sparkling wines, Pinot Noir is a small grape and it comes in small bunches. Pinot Noir is the grape in Burgundy that makes the great wines of Romanée, Chambertin, Beaune, and Corton. —Henry Evans
$150.00 each.

266 Riesling

Vitis vinifera cultivar. Drawn in the Napa Valley in the fall of 1974. Most California Rieslings are evanescent at the very best. A few months of fragile charm and they slip into Victorian declines fit for the heroines of costume novels. Appealing scents of berry descend first to cardamom, then to fernlike, and finally to outright petrolish. Ultraripe, the fragile young are reminiscent of apricot, but these too follow the rest of the evolution to petrollike fumes. Either way, textures slip from lilting to plodding. But the exceptions! The exceptions make not only the price of fresh, cold, cracked Dungeness crab worth paying, they make lake crawdads worth the hunt, turn steamed clams into royal feasts, and save the price of Champagne to go with the strawberries and cream. —Bob Thompson, Notes on a California Cellarbook
$150.00 each.

276 Sauvignon Blanc

Vitis vinifera cultivar. Drawn in the Napa Valley in the fall of 1974. Because Sauvignon Blanc is almost unmistakable for its varietal character, it is a wonderful teacher of both regional character and winemaking style. The variety echoes its red cousin, Cabernet Sauvignon, in tasting of leaves or stalks sooner than of any familiar fruit. Alone among the whites, it tastes so much more of herbs or grasses than berries or apples that, tasting blind, I cannot mistake it for Chardonnay, Pinot Blanc, or Semillon more often than once a week. And yet, as specific as its varietal aromas are, Sauvignon Blanc tends to betray its exact origins with persistent variation on the main theme—a bit grassier here than there, an overtone of melon somewhere else—so mistaking Napa for Sonoma or Sonoma for Santa Barbara is at least as rare an event as missing the variety. —Bob Thompson, Notes on a California Cellarbook
$150.00 each.

281 Sylvaner

Vitis vinifera cultivar. Drawn at the Bud and Jean Van Löben Sels vineyard in Oakville. I recall a particularly fine bottle of Alsatian Sylvaner that Marsha and I had in the dining room of the Hotel Meurice in Paris in January of 1975. No vintage year was given on the wine list, but it proved to be from 1962. We wondered if it could still be good. It was. It had simply marvelous flavor, bouquet, body, balance—everything just right for the meal we had ordered. It was one of those really wonderful eating and drinking experiences that was as much a surprise as it was a pleasure. Eight months later, when I stood in the hot sun of the Napa Valley to look again at Sylvaner grapes, I wondered about how another portion of the same plant that had produced the grapes for the superb bottle of wine we had had in Paris had gotten all the way to the beautiful Napa Valley, and what sort of beverage fit for the gods would be made from it here. —Henry Evans
$150.00 each.

559 Zinfandel

Vitis vinifera cultivar. Although Zinfandel is widely grown in California, its exact origin has been a mystery from the very beginning. We don’t know where it came from, but it grows extremely well and bears very heavily in California. Zinfandel has been made in an infinite number of styles, and the flavor of the grape varies considerably from one vineyard to the next. The Zinfandel wine that I consider to be one of the best presently being made in California is that produced at Storybook Mountain Winery by Jerry Seps. The winery and its vineyard are right up against the northern boundary of Napa County on Highway 128. The name of the winery derives from the fact that it was founded by a member of the Grimm family of fairytale fame. —Henry Evans
$150.00 each.