2019 Heir Apparent Red Wine Cellar Selection Spring Mountain District Napa Valley 750 ml

Spring Mountain is ground zero for some of the most sublime Merlot grown and bottled in Napa.

The high-altitude conditions push the variety, known for soft plushness, out of its comfort zone, resulting in expressions that are rich yet tensile, powerful in frame yet shorn of excess ripeness. The best Right Bank–style releases are well known, coming from names like Pride, Paloma, and Keenan—and there’s usually just a small supply to meet the big demand. 

That’s why we didn’t waste the chance to snap up Heir Apparent’s bombshell Merlot-based blend from a blue-chip Spring Mountain site that sits at 1,800 feet of elevation. Bearing the imprint of some of Napa’s most exclusive terroir, yet shielded by an NDA, it comes from a local winemaker who has earned huge raves from Wine Access members. One called a past bottling “one of the best Wine Access wines I have had,” and said “I find myself needing a special occasion to drink it because I don’t want to run out.”

Spring Mountain has the coolest and wettest climate in Napa Valley. In most years, summer afternoons are moderate, tempered by waterfalls of fog that billow over the AVA’s western ridge and down through the canyons. In the evening, as chilly air settles over the valley floor, warm air pushes up into the mountains. The combined effect of cooler days and warmer nights allows Bordeaux varieties to ripen more slowly than elsewhere, often pushing back harvest into mid- or late October.

In Napa’s sterling 2019 vintage, mountain AVAs produced grapes as bold and luscious as anything the region has seen in years, and the Heir Apparent is a magnificent Spring Mountain expression of that season.