2019 Clendenen Family Vineyards Petit Verdot Santa Maria Valley 750 ml

Jim Clendenen spent nearly four decades putting Santa Barbara County on the wine map. As the founder of Au Bon Climat in 1982, he championed the Santa Maria Valley with a missionary’s conviction, building a devoted following from New York to London to Tokyo. He was called “the Godfather of Santa Barbara County wines” for a reason: no one cared more about what this land could do.

The Clendenen Family Vineyards label—launched in 2000—was Jim’s personal statement, free from commercial pressure. Small lots. Unusual grapes. Winemaking guided by curiosity alone. Nebbiolo aged five years in barrel. Tocai Friulano. Gewürztraminer. And this Petit Verdot—grown on Jim’s own block at Bien Nacido, aged three years in 50% new Taransaud French oak, bottled unfiltered.

Bien Nacido has few peers in Santa Barbara County. Named one of the “Top 25 Vineyards in the World” by Wine & Spirits and crowned a Grand Cru by Wine Enthusiast, its elevation, loamy soils, and ocean-controlled temperatures produce fruit of extraordinary concentration and tension.

Jim had been one of Bien Nacido’s most important fruit buyers since Au Bon Climat’s founding, helping establish its global reputation and push the Miller family to plant unusual varieties. When he planted his own block there in 2000 for Petit Verdot, it was the move of someone who had earned the right to do something genuinely strange—and knew why it would work.

Petit Verdot rarely exceeds 5% of any Bordeaux cuvée—it ripens so reluctantly that French growers can barely coax it across the finish line. Santa Barbara’s ocean-cooled season gives it what it needs: long hang time and gradual accumulation of color and phenolics without overripeness. In planting it at one of California’s Grand Cru sites, Jim created something that doesn’t exist anywhere else.

Hand-harvested on October 14th from a cool, extended 2019 season, the fruit was slow-fermented in small open tanks, then aged three full years in 50% new Taransaud French oak before being fined and bottled unfiltered.

Three years in barrel is a commitment the rest of the industry has largely abandoned—and exactly the kind of patience that defined Clendenen Family Vineyards from the beginning.