Grace Family Vineyard

After leaving the US Marine Corps in 1964, Dick Grace became a stockbroker in San Francisco while he and his wife, Ann, raised Kirk, Mark and Kim in the suburban comfort of Orinda. By the mid-seventies, when the children were teenagers, the idea of moving to the country was holding some allure, and a rundown Victorian that was just out of their price range became both their challenge and their haven. In today’s world full of boutique wineries ...

The Graces were among the first in Napa to implement high-density vine planting and organic farm management.

After carefully moving the mature olive trees on the front acre of the property, they put in more than 1,140 Cabernet Sauvignon Bosché clone vines, twice as many per acre as was then customary. In 1978, they harvested their first commercial crop, which amounted to a paltry 49 cases of wine. One case was dropped and broken, reducing ...

Kirk Grace, Dick and Ann's eldest son, now manages the vineyard. Growing up in the Napa Valley, Kirk was always interested in agriculture, particularly organic and other sustainable practices. Kirk uses time-honored organic viticulture – including biodynamics – to bring out the best in the grapes that grow on his family's vineyard. Biodynamics, a philosophy of cultivation that takes into account certain celestial patterns as well as other orga...

Dick Grace, founder and proprietor of Grace Family Vineyards, has named Helen Keplinger as the winery’s new winemaker. Keplinger joins the family-owned winery, considered by many to be California’s first “cult” winery, to carry on Grace’s vision for producing world-class wines combining quality, craft and appreciation for the land.

“We were determined to find a winemaker who was well-traveled, widely experienced and an excellent fit ...