COLLECTIBLE CALIFORNIA

Anyone who has uncorked a carefully stored 20-year-old Dominus or 30-year-old Ridge Monte Bello knows that California wine can age well. The bouquet is fascinating and evolved, the palate retains some freshness, and the mouthfeel has turned silky—just what’s supposed to happen as a great wine matures.

Last year, London-based wine trading and tracking platform Liv-ex introduced its California 50 Index, and sales of the top collectibles have surged at Sotheby’s in New York City, Hart Davis Hart Wine Co. in Chicago and on the San Francisco-based Vinfolio trading and cellar-management platform. This means that now is an ideal time to collect the crème de la crème of California wines, those with proven ability to improve over time in both enjoyment and worth.

With that in mind, we gathered secondary market data on dozens of wines to calculate the most collectible California bottlings today. We considered wines whose first vintage was at least 15 years ago, those widely regarded to hold or improve in quality with time, ones traded most frequently in the U.S. and abroad, and bottlings with high price appreciation, calculated by comparing release prices and future resale figures