“Kenward and Ames source fruit from some of Napa Valley’s very finest sites for these rich, sumptuous wines. In fact, in some cases, site is really what comes through most in the wines. I am thinking in particular of some of the wines from Vine Hill Ranch Vineyard I saw this year.” ANTONIO GALLONI, VINOUS
Releases September 2025 | Download fact sheet
The Phillips family has represented the best of the Napa Valley grape growing community for three generations. Their Vine Hill Ranch Vineyard is a special part of Tor’s 50-year history in the Napa Valley. He knew its early stewards, Bob and Alex Phillips, who moved to their family’s Oakville vineyard in 1978. Over time, they cultivated it into the world-renowned site it is today – best suited for Cabernet Sauvignon. We now work with their son, Bruce Phillips, where we have two blocks of Cabernet Sauvignon. The Phillips family’s love and dedication to the land are inspirational.
Our 2021 Vine Hill Ranch is a co-ferment of gravelly blocks 4 and 7. In ‘23, Jeff and Tor decided the sum is greater than its parts, and they were right. This wine was fermented for 27 days on the skins. After basket pressing, it matured in 80% new French oak with a combination of Taransaud and Sylvain for twenty months. These two French coopers complement Vine Hill Ranch’s vineyards’ distinctive and beguiling character. Bottled as always without fining or filtration, allowing for maximum development of mouthfeel and texture.
The 2023 Vine Hill Ranch Cabernet is quite possibly my favorite Vine Hill Ranch Cabernet from Tor to date. This year’s version has copious black fruits, a stacked mid-pallet, and has an aromatic profile that I’ve come to associate with the best vintages out of Vine Hill Ranch. As dense and rich as this wine is, it has remarkable smoothness on the finish and follow-through with more ripe blackberry and black cherry. This is also one of Tor’s very favorite VHR bottlings.
—Jeff Ames
I quote my friend Karen MacNeil, wine historian, author of the Wine Bible, “2023 was as perfect as any Napa vintage in living memory. It was Napa’s 1961 Bordeaux.” I remember the 1961 Bordeaux wines well, first tasting most of the First Growths in the 1970s. They were very structured wines, wines that did take a little time to find their “perfect” stride, and when they did, they were wines you never forgot. Across the board, the TOR 2023 wines are instant classics.
