It has been said that every great wine has an even greater story behind it and the Dominus estate is no exception. Owned by the great Christian Moueix of Château Pétrus fame, Dominus is one of the world’s greatest Napa Valley wineries.

After studying oenology in California, Christian fell in love with the region in the late 1960s, instinctively knowing that he could take his Bordelaise savoir-faire and transfer it to a new world territory. Working for John Daniels’ famous Napanook estate during his summer break, he struck up a friendship with Robert Mondovi, and prior to leaving the States asked him to keep an eye out for any opportunities that might become available. That wouldn’t happen until over a decade later, however, when in 1982 Mondovi called saying that an opportunity had arisen at his old stamping ground, and Napabrook were looking for investors.

Moueix formed a partnership with Daniels’ daughter, Robin Lail and Marcia Smith. Believing that the success of the Napa Valley Winery lay in keeping production as authenticly Bordelaise as possible (this is still true today). Thus, Christian sought the help of his Château Pétrus winemaker Jean Claude Berrouet. This approach proved so successful that Moueix became the sole owner of Napabrook, now Dominus in 1995. He immediately enlisted the help of architects Jacques Herzong and Pierre de Meuron and built one of the best wineries the Napa Valley had ever seen. Since Moueix has been the sole manager, the winery has consistently improved its scoring, from the high 80s, to low (then high) 90s, to its perfect 100n for the 2010 vintage. An unprecedented hat trick of three perfect scores for the 2013 vintage sealed his success.

Christian’s credentials bode well for Dominus. Prices for the fabled 2013 are well the over €400 mark in Europe (less in America). This shows a remarkable increase in its secondary market release price with the upward trend looking set to continue for some time.