Failla Wines
Cool-climate Sonoma Coast Pinot and Chardonnay poured in a 1920 hunting cabin on the Silverado Trail. $65 in the lodge, $150 for the library back to 1998.
Why go
Ehren Jordan took a job stocking shelves at a Washington DC wine shop for the beer discount and ended up running the cellar at Turley.1 In between he guided tours at Joseph Phelps, talked his way into its cellar, and went to the Rhône to work for Jean-Luc Colombo in Cornas, which is why Syrah has been in this range since the first vintage.1 He and Anne-Marie Failla launched the label in 1998 as Failla-Jordan, sold his stake in Neyers in 2003 to build a winery in St Helena, and opened this tasting room in 2010.1 The wines ferment in concrete eggs and neutral oak, so nothing gets between the site and the glass, and the eleven-acre estate vineyard sits a few miles off the coast at Cazadero.2 The tasting room itself is a cabin built in 1920, knotted wood and a stone hearth, once owned by Cindy Pawlcyn of Mustards.1
Order this / avoid
- Order: the lodge tasting at $65 and ask for a seat by the front window, which looks onto a Zinfandel vineyard.1
- Order: the library flight at $150 if you want to see how these age. It pulls from the private cellar back to 1998.1
- Avoid: treating this as a Cabernet stop. Jordan's Pinot program runs from Hirsch in 2001 to Platt in 2015, and none of it is Napa red.2
What locals & experts say
- Tina Caputo, Sonoma Magazine:
The 2023 Jurassic Park Chenin Blanc from Santa Ynez Valley ($45), fermented in concrete, is a crisp and lovely wine with lively acidity and notes of green apple and citrus.
1 - Caputo on the room: the cabin is
cozy and homey, with knotted-wood walls and ceilings, and a stone hearth decorated with antlers,
with Adirondack chairs under redwoods on the front lawn.1
Good to know
- Hours: 10am to 4pm daily, by appointment, on (707) 963-0530.1
- Prices move. The $65, $90 and $150 figures are Caputo's, taken on a dated visit, and the winery publishes no reachable visit page. Confirm when you book.
- Hygiene: not established. No inspection instrument for this county is on file here.
Verdict
should-visit — Ehren Jordan learned Syrah working for Jean-Luc Colombo in Cornas, ran Turley's cellar, and then built a house for cool-climate Sonoma Coast Pinot and Chardonnay in the middle of Napa Cabernet country, which is the most interesting thing anyone in this batch has done with a site. He ferments in concrete eggs and neutral oak so the fruit does the talking, and Tina Caputo's Sonoma Magazine visit backs it with notes on the 2023 Jurassic Park Chenin Blanc and the Olivia Chardonnay. The room is a 1920 hunting cabin Cindy Pawlcyn used to own, with a stone hearth and Adirondack chairs under the redwoods, and $65 buys a seat in it. The library flight at $150 runs back to 1998, which is the whole label in one sitting.