2020 SNOWDEN CABERNET SAUVIGNON DUM SPIRO SPERO NAPA VALLEY

“Dum Spiro Spero” – while I breath I hope – is the Snowden family motto which has appeared on every label and every cork since we began producing our own wines 30 years ago.  For our 2020 Cabernet Sauvignon, we are using it to mark a unique cuvée from a unique growing year, when winemaker Diana Snowden Seysses combined the Cabernet Sauvignon which would normally have gone into our Brothers and Los Ricos vineyard designates with Cabernet Franc from our Melchior Kemper block.  Diana loved the small clusters and small berries of 2020, which resulted in “spectacular concentration.  The bouquet is lifted with violets and beeswax.  Plum, black cherry, and Bramble lie beneath."  Writing in Vinous, wine critic Antonio Galloni noted "black cherry, chocolate, leather, licorice, and expresso ... this is a very fine 2020."  Fermented with wild, native yeasts, aged 18 months in French oak barrels, 50% new, and bottled unfined in April, 2022.  Due to the fires of 2020, it is the only red wine we will be releasing under the Snowden label from the vintage.  11,220 bottles were produced, plus 240 magnums.