2018 Shafer Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon One Point Five Stags Leap District Napa Valley 750 ml

Napa Valley icon Shafer has built its reputation over decades. But if you wanted to boil it down to a single bottle, you’d be hard-pressed to find a better one than their 2018 One Point Five Cabernet. 

An absolute stunner grown in one of Napa Valley’s top vintages of this century, the 2018 One Point Five earned a spot among Wine Enthusiast’s Top 100 Cellar Selections of the year AND a 97-point score that puts it alongside a slew of triple-digit-priced Napa Cabs. 

Shafer’s history is the stuff of Napa Valley lore, but it took on a special meaning when we visited the estate. Winemaker Elias Fernandez poured us past vintages of One Point Five, including the 2004, which was still positively stunning after 15 years. As we tasted, he and Doug Shafer held court. They told us how in 1972, Doug’s late father John, then 48 years old, abandoned a publishing career in Chicago and purchased 209 acres in the Stags Leap District. He ripped out the vines, replanted, and in 1978, Shafer produced its first Cabernet from this fruit.

In winery tradition, the founder works tirelessly to get the operation off the ground and set its course, then hands control to the next generation. But because John and Doug Shafer worked so closely from nearly the beginning, they didn’t think the “second generation” label quite applied. So they named this wine “One Point Five” to symbolize the closeness with which father and son worked. 

One of the best bottles ever bearing this iconic label, this is a stunner for the cellar—and a tribute to the greatness of Shafer.