Jim Clendenen was the wild heart of Santa Barbara wine — a Burgundy obsessive who spent forty years proving California Pinot could stand with the old world, and mostly won the argument. He died in 2021, but Au Bon Climat, the winery he founded with Adam Tolmach in 1982, carries on exactly as he built it: fruit from benchmark vineyards like Bien Nacido and Rancho Real, fermented in small lots, punched down by hand, raised in François Frères French oak.
The 2024 comes from an outstanding vintage — Bing cherry and blackberry, hibiscus tea and crushed peppercorn, with the earthy bay-leaf depth that makes Santa Barbara Pinot unmistakable. This is one of the OGs.
