Joseph Phelps 2013 Napa Valley Insignia - Wine & Spirits Magazine

Wine Reviews

Joseph Phelps 2013 Napa Valley Insignia

review by Joshua Greene • October 4, 2016

Leading up to our Top 100 in San Francisco, our critics are sharing some favorite wines that will be poured at the event. We’re posting a new note each day through October 10th.

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Insignia has been built as a regional blend since its first vintage in 1974, becoming an estate-grown wine in 2004. It’s based on cabernet sauvignon grown in six vineyards, from Suscol in the south to sites in Oak Knoll, Stags Leap and Rutherford, up to Phelps’s Spring Valley Home Ranch in St. Helena. Ashley Hepworth has fine-tuned the style, so Insignia is still a rich wine, but now, especially in 2013, shows the kind of firmness of structure that makes the richness profound. This vintage is fresh and lively, even while it is dense and powerful, as if the power is coming out of the black raspberry fruit as well as the bright, sparkling-fresh mineral tones of the tannins. Delicious now if you give it several hours in a decanter, this is destined to evolve into a classic.

Joshua Greene

Joshua Greene is the editor and publisher of Wine & Spirits magazine.

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