About Guenoc & Langtry Estate
Lillie Langtry, the flamboyant British stage actress famous as a mistress of the Prince of Wales, purchased this Guenoc Valley property sight unseen in 1888, arriving in St. Helena by private railroad car and continuing over Howell Mountain by stagecoach with her entourage and paramour Freddie Gebhard. The land already held vineyards planted in 1854, and Langtry brought in her own winemaker, releasing a first vintage in 1891 and proudly declaring her wine "the greatest claret in the country" before selling in 1906.
The vast estate spans roughly 22,000 acres straddling Lake and Napa Counties, with vineyards limited to a few hundred prime acres, and anchors the Guenoc Valley AVA, approved in 1981 with this property as its defining producer. Lake County's oldest and largest winegrower, the estate operates today as Langtry Farms under the stewardship of the Manson family, still a working ranch where one of Langtry's original 1888 Syrah vines, among California's oldest, is being nursed back to health.