Cabernet Sauvignon (1999)

About this wine

This 1999 Chappellet Cabernet Sauvignon is built from Pritchard Hill fruit, with ripe black currant and blackberry at the center of the palate. Aromas show dark chocolate, cedar and a savory tobacco note, and there is a supporting mineral lift that reflects the volcanic soils. The wine is plush and concentrated, yet the texture remains lively, finishing with substantial but refined tannins and a long spicy aftertaste. It was made in the traditional Pritchard Hill style with concentrated mountain fruit and careful oak integration, and critics have noted its density and aging potential. Contemporary reviews describe it as still youthful for the vintage, with layered flavors and a firm structure that have allowed it to evolve in bottle.

About the grape

Cabernet Sauvignon is a Bordeaux crossing that became Napa Valleys flagship black grape, prized for its thick skins, firm tannins, and ability to age, and at Chappellet it is the sole focus of this 1999 bottling. The vines for this wine come from the Chappellet estate on Pritchard Hill, where plantings sit between roughly 800 and 1800 feet above sea level on well drained, rocky soils, and the site has been managed as a mosaic of blocks with careful clonal and rootstock matching. Over decades the estate moved toward organic farming and block by block replanting to optimize clones and training for mountain conditions, using small fermentation lots to preserve the identity of each block. In this wine Cabernet Sauvignon is cultivated and vinified to showcase mountain grown concentration and the specific clonal and site choices made on the Chappellet estate.

Quick facts

• ⛰️ The 1999 Chappellet Signature Cabernet comes from Pritchard Hill, one of Napa’s highest vineyard sites, giving the wine intense concentration from tiny, sun-baked berries.
• 🏺 This 1999 is from Chappellet’s long-running Signature/Signature Cabernet program, a flagship bottling the family has refined since the 1970s and prized by collectors for its ageworthiness.
• 🍒 Many tasting notes of the 1999 highlight bold black-cassis fruit with cedar and anise accents, a profile that reveals a distinctly savory, almost Old-World character as it matures.
• ⏳ Bottles from Chappellet’s hilltop vineyards like the 1999 often show unusually long-lived tannins and structure, meaning a well-stored bottle can evolve for decades into layered complexity.
• 🛖 Chappellet’s estate is famous for its pyramid-roofed winery perched above the vineyards, and a 1999 bottle often sparks stories among collectors about visits up the winding Pritchard Hill road to taste it on-site.

Palate profile

Producer

Chappellet Winery, established in 1967 by Donn and Molly Chappellet, was among the first post-Prohibition wineries in Napa Valley and the first to plant vineyards exclusively on high-elevation hillsides. Their inaugural 1969 Cabernet Sauvignon, crafted under winemaker Philip Togni, received critical acclaim and set a standard for mountain-grown wines. The winery's distinctive pyramid-shaped building, designed by artist Ed Moses, has been described as "the most remarkable wine cathedral of the modern world." Today, the second generation of the Chappellet family continues to uphold their parents' vision, focusing on sustainable farming and producing wines that reflect the unique terroir of Pritchard Hill.