Charles Heintz Vineyards

Charles Heintz Vineyards is one of the Sonoma Coast's most important and celebrated grower estates. Charlie Heintz has been farming his Occidental Road property since 1980 — long before the Sonoma Coast had any critical reputation for fine wine — and has spent four decades supplying fruit to some of California's most celebrated small producers. Failla Wines, Kutch Wines, Williams Selyem, and other top producers have made single-vineyard Charles Heintz designate Chardonnay that has consistently earned 95+ points and helped establish the Sonoma Coast as a serious Chardonnay address.

The Press Democrat's Christopher Chung photographed Heintz 'among the rows of chardonnay grapes at his vineyard, near Occidental' as part of a profile of Sonoma County's iconic growers — a recognition of Heintz's status as one of the defining farming voices in the Sonoma Coast wine story.

With his own estate label, Charlie Heintz bottles the vineyard's story directly — single-vineyard Chardonnay and Pinot Noir that show what four decades of meticulous farming on these specific cool, fog-influenced Occidental hillsides can achieve when the winemaking footprint is kept deliberately minimal. The appointment-only tasting provides rare direct access to one of the Sonoma Coast's most historically important vineyard sources.