Woodward Canyon Artist Series Cabernet Sauvignon 1999

Professional Ratings

• 95 Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
  I was thrilled to have an opportunity to taste Woodward Canyon's 1999 Cabernet Sauvignon Artist Series, inasmuch as this long, relatively cool and even-ripening vintage appears – in hindsight, anyway – as one of the most exciting in Washington's viticultural history. This bottling featured fruit from Champoux Vineyard along with contributions from Klipsun and Pepperbridge. Scents of still fresh cherry, nutmeg, sealing wax, nut oils, iodine, and tobacco presage the complex and richly-, juicily-fruited palate performance of a wine that scarcely betrays its age. The combination of soothing textural richness with clarity and back-end vivacity is typical for the very best Washington Cabernet; subtle soy and salinity help stimulate the salivary glands, and this stains the palate in a vibrant, veritable peacock's tail of a finish. Rick Small and Kevin Mott explain that growers got burned (though anything but literally!) in 1993 when for the first time in the memory of most of them, the fruit failed to adequately ripen. Thus, as 1999 stretched on – far cooler than normal – they were willing to take what was then an unusual step of dropping crop, a step that contributed critically to this vintage's success.
• 93 wine.com
• 91 Wine Spectator