Ridge Vineyards

Ridge Vineyards is a Californian wine producer based in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Its flagship wine, Monte Bello, is a Cabernet Sauvignon-dominated Bordeaux blend known for delivering the complexity and elegance of Bordeaux wines, as well as typical California fruit intensity. This wine has earned numerous awards and accolades over the years.

The renowned trio of vineyards, Monte Bello, Geyservillle and Lytton Springs account for around 75 percent of Ridge's production, with the remainder coming from the estate's East Bench site and seven key contract growers. All of the Bordeaux varieties are grown on the Monte Bello vineyard, situated at around 800m (2600ft) above sea level in the Santa Cruz Mountains, a few miles south of San Jose. Those plots which have been shown to provide the most ageworthy, complex wines go into the flagship wine which bears the vineyard's name. The remaining plots, which tend to produce approachable, youthful wines, are earmarked for the Estate Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. Blind tastings confirm the selection and the wines are blended over two sessions in the following February and May.

Winemaking across the portfolio combines old-school techniques with sophisticated laboratory analysis to give early warnings of any problems. Ridge only uses native yeasts, and avoids filtration in favor of settling and racking with occasional egg-white fining.

While Ridge is best known for its Cabernet, it is also well known for its range of Zinfandel wines and Zinfandel-based blends, led by the Geyserville cuvée. Wines made from Petite Sirah, Carignan and a Grenache – Mataro blend also feature in the range, and Ridge has made a small amount of Chardonnay each vintage for many decades.

Ridge Vineyards was founded in 1962, though the history of the Monte Bello vineyard and winery dates back to the 1880s. Paul Draper, who joined Ridge in 1969, is one of the world's most celebrated winemakers, with awards including Decanter Man of the Year (2000), COPIA Award for winemaking (2004) and the James Beard Award (2007). In 2015, a Decanter Magazine poll of his peers voted him in the top five most admired winemakers in the world.