If you are like me and found an obsession in the older bottlings of Heitz Cellars—back when Joe Heitz was a pioneer in Napa Valley exposing some of the best fruit in the valley—then it’s likely you’ve opened a life-changing bottle that came from the Bella Oaks Vineyard . In 2023 the property celebrated 50 years since its initial planting, put in the ground by initial owners Belle & Barney Rhodes, who acquired the 14-acre property back in 1968 and initially owned & planted the famed Martha’s Vineyard. In 2010, current owner Suzanne Deal Booth made the move to acquire the property with a reverence for the history of the property, and concern for the state in which she and her team found the vineyard. With a series of vine re-planting the famed vineyard necessary for its health, this challenged Deal Booth and her esteemed team of David Abreu as viticulturist and Nigel Kinsman as winemaker to present young vines from the illustrious vineyard…enter Le Génie.
Courtesy of Bella Oaks