Paul Hobbs Winery

Paul Hobbs, one of eleven children, grew up on a family-run orchard in upstate New York. He graduated from Notre Dame with a chemistry degree and then earned a Master's degree in Viticulture and Enology at UC Davis. His first paid winemaking job was at Robert Mondavi Winery in Oakville, from 1978 to 1984, where Robert Mondavi handpicked him for the inaugural Opus One team. In 1985 he moved to Simi Winery in Alexander Valley as assistant winemaker, rising to vice-president/winemaker before leaving in 1989. He consulted for estates including Peter Michael and Lewis Cellars in Napa Valley and Bodegas Catena in Argentina, where his work for Nicolás Catena began in 1989. In 1991 he contacted Larry Hyde in Napa and Richard Dinner in Sonoma about buying five tons of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Cabernet Sauvignon, and those grapes became Paul Hobbs Winery's debut releases. In 1998 he established the Katherine Lindsay Estate in Sebastopol, named for his great-grandmother, and he commissioned architect Howard Backen; the winery was completed in 2003, the year of the estate's first harvest. Beyond Sonoma, he co-founded Viña Cobos in Mendoza in 1998 with Andrea Marchiori and Luis Barraud, and he has also opened wineries in France, Spain, Armenia and New York's Finger Lakes region.

• 1978 to 1984: Robert Mondavi Winery, including the inaugural Opus One team
• 1985 to 1989: Simi Winery, from assistant winemaker to vice-president/winemaker
• 1991: debut releases from Hyde Vineyard and Richard Dinner Vineyard grapes
• 1998: Katherine Lindsay Estate established; 2003: winery completed and first estate harvest
• 2012: George Menini Estate acquired

Founder Paul Hobbs leads the winery's farming and winemaking. Brycen Hill joined in 2017 and is Director of Vineyards. Jeremiah Timm joined as Director of Winemaking in 2024 and works with Paul Hobbs on the laboratory and cellars, including fermentation, aging and bottling. Cellar master Roberto Ruiz has worked in the cellar and across the estate since 2004 and manages the cellar crew.

• Brycen Hill holds degrees in chemistry and plant sciences from Virginia Tech and worked vintages at Virginia wineries and in Corbieres-Boutenac
• Jeremiah Timm's earlier roles were at Moshin, Kosta Browne Winery, Frank Family Vineyards and Browne Family Wines
• Roberto Ruiz manages the cellar crew and estate management processes

Paul Hobbs Winery farms estate-owned sites and the vineyards of longstanding partner growers in the Russian River Valley, West Sonoma Coast and Napa Valley. The Katherine Lindsay Estate, home site of the winery in the Laguna Ridge area of the Russian River Valley, has 13.3 planted acres of Pinot Noir on the Sebastopol soil series, including sandy, clay loam, red clay and alluvial stones. Goldrock Estate on the West Sonoma Coast, five miles from the Pacific Ocean at 550 feet above sea level, has 58.81 planted acres of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir on Goldridge fine sandy loam. In Napa Valley, the Nathan Coombs Estate in Coombsville has 67.53 planted acres of Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Petit Verdot on rocky, volcanic soils. Partner vineyards include the Richard Dinner Vineyard on Sonoma Mountain and the Hyde Vineyard in Carneros, both sources since the 1991 founding, the Fraenkle Cheshier Vineyard in the Sebastopol Hills, and three Beckstoffer vineyards in Napa Valley: To Kalon, where the winery farms a specific block of Cabernet Sauvignon, Las Piedras and Dr. Crane.

• Ross Station Estate (Green Valley, Russian River Valley): 7.5 planted acres of Chardonnay on Goldridge fine sandy loam, around a Victorian home built in the late 1850s
• Edward James Estate (Russian River Valley): 5 planted acres of Chardonnay, named for Hobbs's great-grandfather
• George Menini Estate (Sebastopol Hills, Russian River Valley): 39.15 planted acres of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, acquired in 2012 and named for its former proprietor, apple farmer George Menini
• Cleary Estate (Sonoma Coast, near Freestone): 23.32 planted acres of Pinot Noir on slopes up to 40 percent

Paul Hobbs Winery is a California Certified Sustainable winery. Its vineyards are dry farmed or deficit irrigated, managed with no till or selective under-vine tilling, soil spading and managed cover crops; yields are intentionally limited and each cluster is hand-picked. Grapes are harvested by hand with small shears, fermented solely with native yeasts from the source vineyards and cellar, aged in finely grained French oak barrels and bottled unfined and unfiltered. As of 2025, the Nathan Coombs Estate Cabernet Sauvignon was 100% Cabernet Sauvignon aged in nearly 100% new oak.

• 2023 Russian River Valley Chardonnay: whole-cluster pressed, indigenous yeast fermentation in barrel, aged 15 months in French oak barrels (27% new), bottled unfined and unfiltered in January 2025
• 2023 Russian River Valley Pinot Noir: 12% whole cluster inclusion, 5-day cold soak and 16-day maceration, aged 11 months in French oak barrels (27% new)
• The 2023 harvest began September 20, the latest start in over a decade for the winery

Appellation wines combine several vineyard sources in a single bottle; the 2023 Russian River Valley Chardonnay and Pinot Noir draw on various sites and soils. Vineyard Designate wines each come from a single vineyard, and Cuvée wines are made from specific blocks within the estate vineyards; both are released by allocation to mailing-list members in the spring and fall. The sparkling wines are made by the traditional method from Pinot Noir and released by allocation in the fall. Cabernet Sauvignon comes from the Nathan Coombs Estate, from Coombsville, and from the Beckstoffer To Kalon, Las Piedras and Dr. Crane vineyards.

• Chardonnay: Russian River Valley; Richard Dinner Vineyard; Edward James, George Menini and Ross Station estates; Cuvée Louisa from Goldrock Estate
• Pinot Noir: Russian River Valley; West Sonoma Coast; Cleary, George Menini, Goldrock and Katherine Lindsay estates; Hyde and Fraenkle Cheshier vineyards; Cuvée Agustina from Katherine Lindsay Estate
• Cabernet Sauvignon: Coombsville; Nathan Coombs Estate; Beckstoffer To Kalon, Las Piedras and Dr. Crane vineyards
• Sparkling: Blanc de Noirs, with 2017, 2020 and 2021 vintages in the library

Wine Spectator ranked the Paul Hobbs Pinot Noir Russian River Valley 2008 No. 6 on its Top 100 of 2010, with 94 points at $45. In October 2025 the San Francisco Chronicle's Esther Mobley wrote that the winery's Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir bottlings 'tend to be plush.'

Paul Hobbs puts the approach this way: 'The true character of a site is only revealed through the work and determination of tending each vineyard with meticulous care and vinifying with minimalist winemaking techniques that fully express the terroir.' The winery gives its highest goal as transmitting 'the energy of each vineyard site' into the glass, and its aim as wines 'of intensity, complexity, structure, and balance that reflect the variations of each season.' In an interview with Decanter's Linda Murphy, Hobbs recalled time in Burgundy with Henri Jayer and his determination to make that style of wine in California by picking earlier, adding: 'So I changed my Pinot Noir in 1997.'

Primary sources (producer's own site): https://paulhobbswinery.com/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/our-story/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/history/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/people/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/vineyards/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/farming/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/winemaking/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/appellation/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/wines/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/wines/chardonnay/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/wines/pinot-noir/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/wines/cabernet-sauvignon/, https://paulhobbswinery.com/wines/sparkling/, and the winery's product sheets (PDF): https://paulhobbswinery.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/chrr23-prod-sheet.pdf, https://paulhobbswinery.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/pnrr23-prod-sheet.pdf. Secondary sources: Decanter (Linda Murphy, last updated 22 March 2018), San Francisco Chronicle (Esther Mobley, 30 October 2025) and Wine Spectator's Top 100 of 2010 at a glance (PDF). Last verified 2026-10-19. Where the producer's site and a secondary source disagree, the producer's site governs.