2017 Ovid Winery Experiment W4.7 White

Ovid Napa Valley was founded in St. Helena in 2000 by Mark Nelson and Dana Johnson. The husband-and-wife team started a software company in the 1980s and sold it a decade later, allowing them to pursue their shared interest in wine. They acquired 15 acres on Pritchard Hill and named the winery after the Roman poet Ovid, author of Metamorphoses, which tells the stories of classical Greek and Roman mythology. Ovid had also been the name of the couple’s software company. Nelson and Johnson hired some of Napa Valley’s most esteemed winemaking and viticultural consultants, including David Abreu and Andy Erickson. Today the winemaker is Austin Peterson. Raised in Santa Rosa in a winemaking family, Peterson helped pay for his degree in enology at UC Davis by making and selling his own wines. He worked in winemaking in California, France, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Argentina before joining Ovid in 2006. Ovid’s signature wine is a Bordeaux blend, and the winery produces only about 500 cases a year.

St. Helena AVA is at the northern end of Napa Valley just north of Rutherford and south of Calistoga. It is a relatively warm climate thanks to the Mayacamas Mountains on its western edge, which protect it from Pacific Ocean fog. Out of the 9,000 acres in the appellation, some 1,500 are under vine. The principal grapes grown in St. Helena are the Bordeaux grapes of Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc and Merlot. St. Helena is considered prime wine producing territory, and it was one of the first important wine producing regions in northern California. The legendary Charles Krug founded his winery just north of the town of St. Helena in 1873, and today the appellation is home to many prestigious producers, including Abreu, Grace Family and Spottswoode.