Comments on: Baron Rothschild, Mr. Mondavi and Us

By: Bar M U

Bar M U — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 17:50:35 +0000

I’d like to see the terriers prancing around in a giant barrel, smooshing and juicing the grapes

By: carma

carma — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:36:22 +0000

What a great tour. A friend of mine visited Opus One a few weeks ago, too.

Conveyor belts- go for it!!!!

By: Bin Quick

Bin Quick — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 15:43:11 +0000

Great post, years ago I visited the Boutari winery on Santorini ( http://www.superbgreece.com/Santorini/index.htm ), but I didn’t get the VIP tour. I enjoyed the tech stuff. I had a mental image of you bare-footed w/ a long skirt crushing grapes in a giant wood container. Boy you destroyed that.

By: MAYBELLINE

MAYBELLINE — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 00:59:15 +0000

Wow. Just Wow.

By: Christine

Christine — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 23:37:18 +0000

Hilarious Lisa, I love the series of shots with Andy thinking ‘conveyor belt’. Would you mind if I pilfered a few of your photos (on Flicker) for my own album? I didn’t get many shots off from my iPhone.

Keith and I had a ball and we certainly chose the right friends to come along. Thanks!

By: CGHill

CGHill — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 22:45:52 +0000

I have to admit, when I think Wondrous Wines, I don’t immediately think “conveyor belts.”

Clearly I have much yet to learn in this life.

By: Lisa

Lisa — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 21:58:15 +0000

The Good Baron and the Excellent Mr. Mondavi seemed to have an exuberant Victorian spirit — the kind that says, “One architectural style is great. More than three is even better.” So they tried to incorporate all kinds of different references into the place. I think the pyramid stems from the need to dig deeply to make a climate controlled cave for all the barrels. As long as you’re digging on that scale, might as well make the whole place an underground lair.

By: KathyB

KathyB — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 20:56:44 +0000

Maybe twenty years ago I went to the grand opening of what was aptly called the Applied Science and Technology building on campus. It had a wonderful lab for DESIGNING CONVEYOR BELTS!!! Flat out drool opportunity. Everyone has moved on, building repurposed, not sure anyone still designs such things now on that campus. Hope so.

I understand Andy’s euphoria. Thank you for sharing the tour. The scale is amazing. Macro to the Two Terrier micro.

By: kat

kat — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 20:42:25 +0000

I got to go to a tour & tasting there once years ago, amazing place

By: PAmela

PAmela — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 19:32:47 +0000

Excellent post! Just loved it all. And it becomes clear over the course of your tour why the pyramid (unless there is some mythological additive it imparts to the outcome?) If you wanted to recreate some of that Opus magic, you could set those terriers to digging out a sub and sub-sub-sub basement? Then Andy could dream of …pulleys!