History
Ray had grown up near Masson's La Cresta property, learned winemaking in his cellar and run the Paul Masson company from 1936 to 1942 before buying his own ground. He planted seven acres each of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir in 1945 and added Cabernet in the 1950s from Emmett Rixford's La Questa budwood. Litigation with his investors cost him the estate around 1970, and the partnership that took it renamed the place Mount Eden Vineyards in 1972; Dick Graff and Merry Edwards made some of the first vintages after him. Jeffrey Patterson arrived as assistant winemaker in 1981, took over in January 1983, became a shareholder in 1986 and majority owner with his wife Ellie in 2008. He retired in 2025 as winemaker emeritus, with Austin Chin taking over. The family added the 55 acre Domaine Eden lower down the slope in 2007.
The Site
About 40 planted acres at 2,000 feet, above the fog, on east-facing slopes of austere and infertile Franciscan shale over decomposed rock. Roughly 20 acres are Chardonnay, seven Pinot Noir and thirteen the Bordeaux varieties. The elevation is what makes the estate work: it sits above the marine layer that fills the valleys below, so the vines get sun and cold nights rather than fog.
Vines and Blocks
The heritage here is clonal rather than literal. A rolling replanting programme put in twelve acres of Cabernet and seven of Chardonnay in 1980, replaced the last original Chardonnay through the 1990s and the last original Pinot Noir in 1997, so the oldest producing vines date from 1980 rather than 1945. What has been continuous is the selection itself, propagated forward each time. By the mid-1970s UC Davis had named it the Mount Eden clone, and it is now recognised as one of California's heritage Chardonnay selections, distinct from the Wente line and planted at estates well beyond this mountain. No internal blocks are named.
The Wines
The estate bottles Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and a Cabernet-based red, with a Chardonnay Reserve in strong years, all under the Mount Eden label rather than a vineyard designation, which is why the wines carry no vineyard name at all. Mount Eden also makes a Chardonnay from the Wolff Vineyard in Edna Valley, three hundred miles south, and has done since 1985; that wine is labelled Edna Valley and has nothing to do with this mountain.