Winemaker Notes
Year after year, Gap’s Crown Vineyard delivers pinot noir with sensational poise. Nearly constant wind and fog from the famed Petaluma Gap create clusters with thicker skins and smaller berries – perfect pinot noir. With higher skin content and cooler temperatures, this pinot noir is loved for its plush tannins and incredible density. On the nose, you’ll discover this wine’s signature blackberry and boysenberry profile, intertwined with hints of graphite and ginger. Toasty and savory elements complement the dense core, making this another stunner of a year for Gap’s Crown Vineyard Pinot Noir.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
Bright and citrus driven, this estate wine is velvety in texture and plush yet structured. Blackberry, black cherry and wild raspberry notes are rich and complex, met with hints of violet, dried herb and nicely integrated oak.
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Wine Spectator
Big, rich and well-spiced, with a concentrated core of red currant, cherry and plum flavors backed by fresh acidity and firm tannins. Minerally in the midpalate, with a finish offering slate and hints of peppercorn. Drink now
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Jeb Dunnuck
The 2019 Pinot Noir Gap's Crown Vineyard has rich aromas of smoky cedar, five spice, and baked raspberry. The palate is soft, with ripe up-front fruit of red cherry and dusty earth, followed by orange peel citrus on the finish.
Three Sticks Wines is a boutique, family-owned winery recognized for pinot noir and chardonnay. Proprietor Bill Price III (nicknamed “Billy Three Sticks”) owns six Grand Cru level estate vineyards in Sonoma County, including three Heritage vineyards–Durell, Gap’s Crown, and Walala and three Monopole vineyards–One Sky, Alana, and William James. An intimate relationship with each property shines through in each of the Three Sticks wines, reflecting a keen understanding of how working with great vineyards, along with a meticulous winemaking style, produces inspiring results.
The Vallejo-Castenada Adobe (built in 1842) was built by Captain Salvador Vallejo, brother of General Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo, the Commandante Generale of the northern territory of Mexico (modern day Sonoma). The Prices purchased the property in 2012 and embarked on a two-year preservation project. The Three Sticks team worked with Sonoma historians and the Sonoma League for Historic Preservation to restore and protect the fabric of the property. They commissioned San Francisco-based designer Ken Fulk and his team to design the ambience of the Adobe, as it is known locally. The historic landmark in downtown Sonoma is now home to the hospitality of Three Sticks.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
A vast appellation covering Sonoma County’s Pacific coastline, the Sonoma Coast AVA runs all the way from the Mendocino County border, south to the San Pablo Bay. The region can actually be divided into two sections—the actual coastal vineyards, marked by marine soils, cool temperatures and saline ocean breezes—and the warmer, drier vineyards further inland, which are still heavily influenced by the Pacific but not quite with same intensity.
Contained within the appellation are the much smaller Fort Ross-Seaview and Petaluma Gap AVAs.
The Sonoma Coast is highly regarded for elegant Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and, increasingly, cool-climate Syrah. The wines have high acidity, moderate alcohol, firm tannin, and balanced ripeness.