June in Napa Valley is a blessed season.
The sun blazes dazzlingly, but the cool breeze blowing in from the Pacific tempers the heat of the grapevines. Coombsville, located at the southern end of Napa Valley, is a little different from Napa Valley’s typical climate. Though it is only ten minutes by car from downtown Napa, this place boasts a unique terroir where volcanic ash soil meets cool sea winds.
With Warren beside me, I drove the pickup truck toward Lapis Lazuli, the new treasure vault located in Coombsville.
“Robert coveted Lapis Lazuli a great deal, of course, and so did that fellow William Harlan.”
“What about you, sir?”
“I was a little different. I thought uniform, high-quality Merlot was absolutely necessary, but that it could be obtained well enough in Sonoma. Napa Valley Merlot? Well... to be honest, I wasn’t sure. So when Robert told you about Lapis Lazuli, I didn’t say anything, but honestly... I wasn’t exactly positive about it.”
“Really?”
When I tilted my head and looked at him, Warren continued answering as he admired the vineyard scenery outside the window.
“For one thing, it was too expensive for growing Merlot. And the fact that there were too many vineyards bothered me as well.”
“Ah... I understand.”
By American standards, if someone says they have a one-hundred-acre farm, it is considered a small, family-centered operation. That is because the average farm size is about 440 acres. Of course, that data includes pastures and grain farms, so the story changes completely when it comes to orchards—especially vineyards.
A hundred acres is a considerably large scale even in Napa Valley, and the fact that those vineyards were scattered here and there was a weakness worth pointing out. Screaming Eagle, called the finest cult wine in Napa Valley, has an estate vineyard of only about forty acres, and Harlan Estate is between forty and fifty acres, so one can imagine just how large a hundred acres is.
“I saw adding another vineyard here as perhaps taking on more risk, and because you bought it at a high price, I was uneasy. Since it was an expensive vineyard, you would inevitably pay more attention to it, and while focusing on that, I thought you might end up missing the truly important thing—Redwood.”
“That is a perfectly reasonable point.”
At my cool admission, he looked at me as if it were something new.
“You really are different from other young people.”
“Pardon? In what way?”
“When I point something out to other young people, they’re busy making excuses first. Even if they have a legitimate reason, they start protesting before they’ve even heard my whole point. But you, even though you surely have your reasons, accept it first.”
“Because what you said is correct.”
“In any case, don’t misunderstand. I wasn’t positive about Master’s decision, but that doesn’t mean I was negative. It was simply a matter of wondering, ‘Will that really bring positive results?’ I was also curious what Merlot touched by Master’s hand would feel like.”
“Oh, if that’s what you’re thinking, then you’re about to have a very enjoyable experience. There’s a reason I went out of my way to acquire a Merlot vineyard.”
“Oh? Is that so? I’m looking forward to it.”
His eyes sparkled as he wore an expectant expression.
When we arrived at our destination, Lapis Lazuli was shining like a blue jewel, just as its name suggested. In particular, even amid the terrible frost damage that had swept through Napa early this year, the Merlot here had formed a healthy canopy without a single vine being damaged.
After getting out of the truck, the two of us began walking slowly between the grapevines. The Merlot in June was passing through the fruit-set period, when the flowers had fallen and small berries were forming.
I called Ortega, the manager in charge of this place. A Mexican immigrant in his fifties, he was a professional vineyard manager with considerable experience in Napa Valley. After I acquired Lapis Lazuli last year, he had been managing the place since early this year.
“You’ve arrived.”
He greeted Warren and me with great deference. The fact that he did not dare look down on me despite my youth was partly thanks to Warren standing beside me, but it was probably also because he knew how significant my instructions had been in safely overcoming that devilish cold snap earlier this year.
No matter how much someone owns a gigantic winery, if they do not know vineyards well, people like these managers tend to look down on them behind their backs, even if not to their faces, and often refuse to listen.
I greeted him with a faint smile, then touched one of the grapevine leaves in front of me and said,
“Yes. It’s an important time, so I came by.”
“That’s right. June is an important period. As everyone knows, Merlot is more delicate than Cabernet. Its skin is thinner, and its acidity drops faster. From here on, I’m thinking of being more aggressive with leaf thinning so the grapes get more direct sunlight.”
Warren, who had been listening at my side, nodded. Ortega’s explanation was so textbook-standard that it would not have been strange to see it in a manual. Maximizing sunlight to ripen the grapes fully. Without him needing to say it, I knew he believed that was how the tannins would ripen smoothly instead of harshly.
I shook my head and said calmly,
“We won’t be doing that from now on.”
For a moment, Ortega was greatly surprised, and Warren, who had already been told on the way here that he would have an enjoyable experience, looked at my mouth with deeply intrigued eyes.
“We won’t be doing that?”
“From now on, we’ll give the Merlot not direct sunlight, but dappled light.”
My answer directly overturned the thinking of those who had been growing grapes in Napa Valley until now. So Ortega asked with an expression that said he could not understand.
“Give it less sunlight? Then the sugar level will...?”
To grapes, sunlight means ripening, and ripening means an increase in sugar content. In this era, growing grapes ultimately means judging the quality of the fruit by how sweet and deeply colored it is when harvested. So one can imagine how absurd the idea of giving them less sunlight sounded to these people.
“That’s right. In detail, think of it as lowering the Brix by about two. We’ll prioritize acidity, not sugar.”
“Is there a reason for doing that?”
“It’s because prioritizing sugar leads to excessive tannins. In conclusion, what I want is to value texture more than flavor. Do you understand what I mean?”
Unlike Ortega, who was flustered, Warren immediately understood what I was talking about.
“Texture... You’re pointing out the fundamental problem with Merlot.”
As expected, Warren understood why I had changed the cultivation method like this.
“That’s right. When people drink well-ripened Merlot, they think it tastes good at first, but strangely, they don’t drink much of it.”
“Indeed. It isn’t because the flavor is weak. The more you drink it, the drier your mouth gets, and the harder it becomes to keep drinking.”
“Exactly. I believe that’s because when Merlot is over-ripened, its sugar rises, but the tannins veer in a sharp, drying direction. So I’m pursuing a Merlot that is easy to drink, soft, and makes you want to keep drinking. One that blends with a firmly structured Cabernet Sauvignon, spreads smoothly in the mouth, connects the structure of the Cabernet, and tidies up the finish.”
“Ah, so that was what you meant. A Merlot that refines the texture...”
Warren looked at the vines and pondered for a while, then soon wore an expression of admiration.
“Remarkable. Now I understand why you acquired this vineyard yourself. What you needed wasn’t simply well-ripened Merlot.”
“That’s right. I needed Merlot with the feeling I wanted. The Merlot I obtained through the auction before was actually the closest to the Merlot I wanted.”
“It was. For a Merlot, it wasn’t excessive, and its texture was on the softer side.”
Seeing him nod, I turned my head toward Ortega.
“So the Merlot made here at Lapis Lazuli must do three things for texture, not flavor. One of them is sunlight management. Rather than fully exposing the clusters, we’ll maintain partial shade with the leaves. Therefore, in June, you must not remove the leaves. Just a little at the top... Understood? In truth, I believe seventy percent of Merlot’s quality is determined in June.”
Ortega, the Mexican immigrant, was already absorbed in my explanation, and he asked with a captivated look.
“Then what are the other two?” “We won’t reduce the yield.” “Pardon?”
This time, though he had been listening seriously as if determined not to be surprised, he was startled once again.
“You’re saying you’ll grow it as it is without reducing the yield?”
Even Warren could not help but cut in and ask.
“Yes. This is similar in reason to reducing the sunlight, in a way.”
At that, Warren immediately realized what I was trying to say.
“Ah, I see. In the end, you’re moving from a Brix-centered approach to a texture-centered approach...”
But Ortega was not a winemaker, so he still wore an expression of incomprehension, and I explained kindly.
“Why do you think yield is reduced?”
“Well... to concentrate the vine’s energy... Ah...!”
“That’s right. You need to select them appropriately so sugar and nutrients concentrate in the remaining clusters. But if you reduce it like that, the tannins become excessive, and the ratio of skin and seeds rises too much. So the cluster size should be medium to slightly small. The spacing between clusters only needs to not be too tight.”
“Understood. Then the last one is...?”
“Water. We’ll cultivate Merlot in a way quite different from Redwood’s water management system.”
At those words, Warren focused deeply and asked,
“Does that mean you won’t use SWP?”
By this time, SWP, stem water potential, had become quite standard throughout Napa Valley. Ortega, the manager here, had also undergone three months of training at Redwood before working here. Though he already had more than twenty years of experience, that much time was naturally necessary for him to work as a manager at Redwood, and of course, Ortega had learned the water-stress technique using SWP.
In that sense, Napa Valley had reached the stage where a vineyard that did not use SWP was considered behind the times. Yet I, who knew that better than anyone, was saying I would use a different method, so they could not help but be curious.
“It’s not that we won’t use it at all. We’ll change the method. Cabernet Sauvignon withstands stress well, so there’s no problem, but Merlot is different. It’s much more sensitive. So instead of keeping it in a long starving period and giving it water when it reaches its limit, we’ll give it small amounts steadily.”
“Steadily?”
“Yes. I’m not saying it doesn’t need stress. Keep it moderately thirsty, but consistently...”
“What’s the reason for that?”
“SWP tells you how thirsty it is, but it doesn’t tell you when it became thirsty or how long it has been thirsty, does it? I think that’s why wine can become rough even when the SWP readings are normal.”
At my words, Warren looked into the air as if he had realized something.
“That’s true. That happens often.”
When a sudden abnormal heat wave is added to a lack of moisture, even just one or two days of stress can make Merlot strengthen its skin cells and accelerate seed maturation. So later, when one looks only at SWP and judges that there was no problem with water stress, the wine that results can be completely different because of excessive tannins.
This would only be understood after 2010, and it was only after 2015 that people began paying serious attention to this part. Before then, it had generally been believed that the amount of stress was what mattered, but before 2010, strange discrepancies that could not be confirmed by numbers alone began appearing, and people started investigating the cause.
“So what Master is saying is that Cabernet is strong against stress and can endure even if that period is long, but Merlot is different?”
“Uh... something like that. There’s also the fact that Cabernet is stronger, but since Cabernet inherently needs strong structure, I don’t think a little overripeness is a major issue. But Merlot reacts quickly to stress, and once it’s startled, it immediately changes the character of its skin and seeds. A single brief shock can completely change the character of that year’s wine. So what matters in Merlot cultivation is stability and continuity. Even if the yield is low.”
“That makes sense. It does make sense.”
Warren continued nodding with an admiring face, then gave Ortega instructions.
“Manage it according to Master’s instructions, keep checking the state of the vineyard, and report to me. Report to me at least once every two days.”
“I will make certain to do so.”
“I’ll be stopping by once every four days, so keep that in mind.”
After Warren and I finished giving Ortega detailed work instructions, we headed back toward my pickup truck.
“If William Harlan finds out that Astra Veil still has room to rise even further in quality, he’ll be so sick with envy he’ll want to die.”
“Haha, he probably will.”
“I felt it again today—that joining Redwood was truly the right choice.”
I climbed into the car with a broad grin.
“Let’s hurry and get going. If we’re late, that person will be waiting.”
“Let’s. That fellow is a bit exacting, and he doesn’t like people being late to appointments.”
We quickly set off for Redwood. We had a meeting scheduled with Rainmaker for the installation of additional wells.