High on the wooded slopes above Calistoga, at the end of a winding drive through a tunnel of trees, sits one of the most historically significant wineries in the United States. Schramsberg does not announce itself with a grand chateau or a sweeping terrace. Its drama lies underground, in nearly two miles of hand-dug caves where millions of bottles of sparkling wine rest in the cool dark, slowly transforming through the same traditional method used in Champagne.
To understand American sparkling wine, you have to understand Schramsberg. This is the estate that proved California could produce a bottle-fermented sparkling wine worthy of the world stage, and its story stretches back more than a century and a half, longer than almost any other operating winery in Napa Valley.
A Nineteenth-Century Beginning
The story begins in 1862, when a German immigrant named Jacob Schram purchased a parcel of hillside land on Diamond Mountain and began planting vines. Schram and his workers carved cellars directly into the volcanic rock of the mountainside, the same caves that anchor the estate today. By the late nineteenth century, Schramsberg had become one of the most celebrated wineries in California.
The author Robert Louis Stevenson visited in 1880 during his honeymoon in the valley and wrote admiringly about the place and its wines in his book about the area. For a time, Schram's wines were poured in the finest establishments and his hillside estate was a destination for the curious and the well-heeled alike.
Then came decline. After Jacob Schram's death and the arrival of Prohibition in 1920, the winery fell silent for decades. The vineyards were largely abandoned, the great caves sat empty, and the property passed through a succession of owners without returning to serious winemaking. The grand experiment of the nineteenth century seemed to have ended.
The Davies Family and a Bold Bet
The modern era of Schramsberg began in 1965, when Jack and Jamie Davies purchased the dilapidated property and set out to do something no one in California had truly accomplished: make a world-class sparkling wine using the traditional method, the labor-intensive process by which the wine undergoes its second fermentation inside the very bottle in which it is sold.
It was an audacious decision. At the time, most American sparkling wine was made cheaply and bore little resemblance to the great wines of Champagne. The Davieses chose instead to focus on the classic Champagne grape varieties, chiefly Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, and to commit to the slow, expensive, hand-crafted approach. They were betting that American soil and American craftsmanship could produce something genuinely fine.
That bet defined the rest of their lives and reshaped the category. Schramsberg became the standard-bearer for premium American sparkling wine, and the Davies family name became synonymous with the idea that the United States could compete with the best bubbles in the world.
The Toast to Peace
The moment that sealed Schramsberg's place in history came in 1972. When President Richard Nixon traveled to China on his landmark diplomatic mission, the wine chosen for the famous Toast to Peace at the state banquet in Beijing was Schramsberg's Blanc de Blancs, a sparkling wine made entirely from Chardonnay.
The symbolism was deliberate and the exposure was enormous. An American sparkling wine, served at one of the most consequential diplomatic events of the century, broadcast to the world that California could make something worthy of the occasion. It was a watershed moment not just for Schramsberg but for the entire American wine industry, which was still years away from its breakthrough at the 1976 Paris Tasting. Since that day, Schramsberg wines have been poured at official functions under administrations of both parties.
How the Wine Is Made
What sets Schramsberg apart is its uncompromising commitment to the traditional method. After the base wines are blended, each bottle is sealed with a small amount of yeast and sugar to trigger a second fermentation inside the glass. That fermentation produces the fine, persistent bubbles that distinguish a serious sparkling wine, and it happens slowly, over months and years, in the cool stability of the caves.
The bottles must then be riddled, gradually turned and tilted so the spent yeast settles into the neck, a process still demonstrated by hand at the estate even though much of the production is mechanized. Finally the neck is frozen, the plug of sediment removed, and the bottle topped up and corked. It is painstaking work, and it is the reason traditional-method sparkling wine commands the respect it does.
Visiting Schramsberg
A visit to Schramsberg is unlike a visit to almost any other Napa winery, because the experience centers on the caves. Tours lead guests deep into the cool, candlelit tunnels first dug in 1862, past walls stacked with riddling racks and bottles aging in the dark. The contrast between the bright valley outside and the hushed, earthy world below is part of what makes the visit memorable.
Tastings are seated and guided, and they typically move through a range of the house sparkling wines, often including the famous Blanc de Blancs. Because the estate sits up a private road on the mountainside and tours are conducted on a schedule, reservations are essential; this is not a walk-in winery. Plan ahead, leave time for the full cave experience, and dress with a light layer, because the caves stay cool year round.
For anyone who wants to understand the full sweep of Napa Valley, Schramsberg offers something the Cabernet houses cannot: a direct link to the nineteenth-century origins of the valley and a living demonstration of the craft behind great sparkling wine. It is a reminder that Napa's story did not begin with Cabernet, and that some of its most remarkable wine rises in bubbles rather than sitting still in the glass. To find more sparkling producers, browse our directory of sparkling wineries.
