Summary: On Aug. 18, 2025, Schramsberg began its harvest on Diamond Mountain with a sabering ceremony. The Davies family, staff and guests participated in the ritual blessing of the grapes. The cool season is expected to yield high acidity, and the winery’s experienced team continues to guide one of Napa’s longest-standing sparkling wine producers.
Sabering the Grapes — Schramsberg Marks a Milestone in Napa’s 2025 Harvest
By Tim Carl
CALISTOGA, Calif. — With a flash of steel and a spray of foam, Schramsberg’s sparkling wine was sabered open and poured over the year’s first bins of grapes. Joined by family, colleagues and friends on Diamond Mountain, Hugh Davies marked the occasion as more than tradition — it was the ceremonial beginning of their 2025 harvest.
The ceremony wasn’t the valley’s first fruit of 2025 — Mathiasson and a handful of others had already filled their bins. But this was different. This was ritual. This was sabering.
A Ritual With Roots
Sabering, or sabrage, traces back to the Napoleonic era, when French cavalry officers celebrated victories by striking Champagne bottles with their swords. At Schramsberg, the tradition has been reshaped into a ritual “blessing of the grapes.” A bottle is sabered into the air, then its foamy contents poured over the first bins of fruit. It’s a gesture meant to bring good fortune and to bind the moment with history.
This year dozens of people attended, including cellar and vineyard crews, Hugh’s wife Monique and one of their sons, Emrys. The sight of family, longtime employees and newcomers lined up together gave the event a sense of continuity that transcended its pageantry.
History in Perspective
Schramsberg is one of Napa Valley’s oldest wineries, founded in 1862 by German immigrant Jacob Schram. Nearly a century later, the property lay dormant until Jack and Jamie Davies bought it in 1965 and set out to produce sparkling wine that could stand alongside the best in the world. Sparkling wine had little footing in California then, but the Davieses persisted.
By the 1970s, Schramsberg had captured the nation’s attention as its sparkling wines graced White House state dinners and the tables of renowned restaurants. What started as an ambitious revival of an overlooked hillside estate blossomed into one of America’s most celebrated sparkling-wine houses. Today, the legacy continues as Hugh Davies leads Schramsberg’s sparkling program, while also overseeing the family’s red wines under the Davies Vineyards label.
A Cool Season, a Later Start
The 2025 season has been shaped by unusually cool weather along the Pacific Coast. For Davies, that’s a good sign.
“We’re excited about the harvest for sure. We always are,” he said. “This first fruit came from the Richburg Vineyard in Carneros. From here we’ll be picking through the last cabernet for our Davies reds into late October, maybe even the first week of November. It’s exciting — there’s a pace and a process but also a beautiful unpredictability you have to enjoy.”
Cooler conditions, he noted, bring more acidity at lower sugar levels.
“That’s not a bad thing — it gives us the bright, vibrant, tart character we want,” he said. “It’s easier when there’s an abundance of acidity in the fruit.”
From Extremes to Balance
For contrast, Davies recalled the chaos of 2020.
“That year was unbelievably crazy between COVID restrictions and wildfires. We were off the electrical grid for 77 days. We kept operating with a generator until the Glass Fire surrounded us. That was an extreme,” he said. “Compared to that, this year looks gentle and smooth.”
The calm comes at a time when Napa’s market itself is searching for balance. After COVID hit, consumers flush with cash bought wine in record amounts, pushing inventories to bursting. The 2023 harvest was among the largest on record. But by 2024 demand slowed, and in 2025 the pace has cooled further.
“It doesn’t only go up. It cannot only go up,” Davies said.
He believes sales are stabilizing at a more sustainable level.
Leadership and Continuity
Vice President of Winemaking Sean Thompson marked his 20th harvest at Schramsberg this year and his 33rd overall in the wine industry. For him, the season still carries the same charge as his first.
“The first harvest of the season always feels fresh and new,” Thompson said. “You only get one chance every year, and I’m more excited about the team I have around me than anything else. Their enthusiasm keeps me from getting old and jaded.”
For Thompson, 2025 looks especially strong. He pointed to the winery’s decision to pare down vineyard sources and focus only on sites that deliver the acidity and drive essential for sparkling wine.
“If we could pick everything at 15 grams, we would,” he said.
By “15 grams,” he meant 15 grams per liter of titratable acidity — the natural tartness that gives sparkling wine its lift and longevity. That level of acidity is rare but prized, a benchmark for freshness and vibrancy in the finished wine.
That approach echoes a larger trend in Napa, where vineyard removals are reshaping the landscape as producers prioritize quality and compatibility with their winemaking vision instead of maximizing yield. Unlike the cold, drawn-out vintages of 2010 and 2011 — when Schramsberg was still picking chardonnay out of Marin in November — Thompson expects red harvest to finish by October.
Carrying that vision forward is a seasoned team whose collective experience spans decades. Sparkling winemaker Jessica Koga first joined the winery in 2001 and has helped guide harvests for nearly two decades. Sam Rubanowitz, director of viticulture, manages the vineyards, while Katelyn Hill, assistant winemaker, and J.P. Pierce, red wine specialist, oversee crush and fermentation. In the cellar, master craftsman Tony Avina keeps presses and tanks moving, supported by lab technician Cameron Rose and longtime crew members Heriberto and Sal, with Rosa joining the crew this year. That continuity reaches back even farther through Beth Wagner, club manager, and senior cellar lead Miguel Moreno, both of whom started in 1980.
“They started here when I was in high school,” Davies said. “They’re still here. That’s pretty cool.”
Humor, Humility and Renewal
There was laughter when the saber’s stroke sent corks skittering across the crush pad and applause when Hugh, Monique and Emrys stepped forward to christen the grapes. The spectacle was theatrical, but beneath the sparkle lay humility — an acknowledgment that farming and winemaking remain fragile pursuits, shaped as much by weather, markets and global currents as by human effort.
That is why sabering continues to resonate. It reminds us that joy still matters. The blessing of the grapes — once a modest vineyard ritual, equal parts reverence and celebration — endures in modern Napa, expressed with the gleam of a saber and the spray of sparkling wine.
Forklifts rumbled as bins tipped into presses and juice began to flow. The first fermentations of 2025 were underway. The cool season promises acidity. The team’s experience promises consistency. And at Schramsberg, harvest is more than farming and markets — it is tradition and celebration, shared with friends and family.
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Tim Carl is a Napa Valley-based photojournalist.
Early 2025 Napa Valley Harvest at a Glance
Aug. 8 – Mumm Napa picks pinot noir (Yountville) and Round Pond Estate picks chardonnay (Rutherford) for sparkling wine.
Aug. 11 – Pinot noir from Truchard Vineyard (Carneros) harvested for rosé by The Vice.
Aug. 12 – Benessere Vineyards (St. Helena) brings in pinot grigio — earliest pre–Aug. 15 pick on record for the winery.
Aug. 14 – Sauvignon blanc picked in Pope Valley and Gordon Valley (Inglenook, St. Supéry). Matthiasson Wines harvests chardonnay from Linda Vista Vineyard (Napa) for sparkling and peach wine.
Aug. 15 – Sauvignon blanc harvest at Honig Vineyard & Winery (Rutherford).
Aug. 18 – Schramsberg begins sparkling harvest.
Coming weeks – Viognier expected by mid-September; chardonnay, sauvignon blanc and early reds such as pinot noir and syrah in late September; merlot, cabernet franc and cabernet sauvignon into October, weather permitting.
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