Ink Grade is the Howell Mountain estate that Gaylon Lawrence acquired alongside Heitz Cellar in 2018. Heitz had long used the roughly 750-acre ranch as a blending source, and in 2020 Lawrence Wine Estates launched it as its own label under winemaker Matt Taylor, a Windsor native who spent six years at Eisele Vineyard and worked at Domaine Dujac and Joseph Swan. The vineyards are farmed organically and biodynamically with Demeter certification.

The estate occupies a remote, east-facing bowl in the northeast corner of the Howell Mountain AVA, terraced into extreme slopes of volcanic tufa soil among pine and sequoia stands. Taylor works in a restrained, Old World register: native fermentation, French oak with a modest share of new barrels and bottling around 14% ABV, well below the Napa norm. The Ink Grade Howell Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon shows pine needle, currants, blueberries and ripe plums over fine, polished mountain tannins, with 94-point scores from James Suckling and the Wine Advocate, while the Ink Grade Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon offers black cherry, cassis, crushed stone and graphite with real freshness.

It is a new name from one of Napa's most historic ownership groups, and one of the mountain's most exciting debuts. Browse our full Ink Grade collection with fast nationwide shipping delivered straight to your door.