Ad Vivum is Stunning Napa Valley

The past couple of weeks we have been tasting some of Singapore’s top restaurants on our more exclusive, limited allocation wines, such as Ad Vivum. And the response has been unbelievable, with the sommelier team at Odette loving the wines so much they have reserved a good chuck of the wines to begin pouring the first week of August. So, it only makes sense that we share how amazing these single-vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon wines are from Napa Valley. If the top restaurant in Singapore agrees, let’s get a bottle or two in your glass. And the wines will also be at Artemis starting tomorrow! Great pedigree and we are excited!

The genesis of what would become Ad Vivum dates back to 2005 when Chris Phelps began working with Cabernet Sauvignon grapes from Sleeping Lady Vineyard on a purely experimental level. By 2007, he was convinced that the site could produce world-class wine. Lary Bettinelli, the owner of Sleeping Lady, agreed to set aside a small block of vines for Phelps.

Chris Phelps was born into a wine-loving family. Phelps completed a degree in enology at U.C. Davis, then studied viticulture and enology at the University of Bordeaux. He was selected by his future mentors, Christian Moueix and enologist Jean-Claude Berrouet, of Château Pétrus and Ets. Jean-Pierre Moueix, to direct winemaking at Château des Laurets in Puisseguin-St. Émilion for the 1982 harvest.

This led to extensive training at Château Pétrus and other Moueix properties on the Right Bank and then to 12 years as the founding winemaker at Dominus Estate, the Napa Valley property owned by Moueix.

After Dominus, Phelps made the wines at Caymus Vineyards before starting his consulting business. His winemaking experiences in Napa and Bordeaux led him to create what he now calls “New World wines with an Old-World sensibility.”

Since 2007, Phelps has produced Ad Vivum, his single vineyard Napa Valley Cabernet sourced from the Sleeping Lady Vineyard in Yountville, California.