About Dehlinger Winery
Tom Dehlinger, a former pre-med student turned UC Davis-trained enologist with stints at Beringer, Hanzell, and Dry Creek Vineyard, was 28 when he planted 14 acres on an aging apple ranch outside Sebastopol in 1975, one of the first winemakers to revive western Sonoma County after Prohibition; only 35 wineries existed in the county when he applied for his bond. With his architect brother Dan he built the estate's now-iconic Octagon House atop the hill.
Fifty years on, Dehlinger remains fiercely independent and family-run, producing about 7,000 cases of estate-only Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Syrah, and Cabernet Sauvignon from the red gravelly Vine Hill Road ridge, with daughters Carmen and Eva now running the winery and overseeing the vineyard's second generation of vines. Over three quarters of production sells through a devoted mailing list, a model the family adopted after closing their tasting room back in 1996.