Most of the grapes for this bottling came from Navarro's finest Chardonnay vineyard, which historically has been the centerpiece of our Première Reserve bottling. Navarro's Hammer Olson vineyard was planted in 1983 on AxR1 rootstock and within a decade became our favorite Chardonnay vineyard. In 1996, we decided to expand this field by continuing the planting up the hill, but around this time Californians discovered that AxR1 was susceptible to phylloxera, so our upper extension was planted using resistant rootstock. In 2008, we decided to replant the lower half of the old field with vines similarly grafted onto resistant rootstock. The entire field is now being harvested as three separate lots. In January 2014, after the wines had time to clarify in the barrel, we sampled the separate lots.

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